Systems and methods for converson between digital and analog for photonic neural networks

An electronic-photonic integrated circuit (EPIC) device, comprising:

• an electrical integrated circuit (EIC) configured to generate electrical input signals and receive electrical output signals;
• an optical source configured to provide light;
• and
• a photonic integrated circuit (PIC), comprising:
• a plurality of optical modulators, each configured to modulate a portion of the light to produce a corresponding optical input signal, wherein one of the optical modulators comprises two or more modulator segments controlled by distinct electrical input signals, such that the corresponding optical input signal is determined based on a combination of the distinct electrical input signals;
• an optical core configured to perform kernel-based operations on the optical input signals to generate optical output signals, wherein a first subset of the optical input signals corresponds to input data for the kernel-based operations, and a second subset of the optical input signals corresponds to kernel weights for the kernel-based operations;
• and
• an optoelectronic output module comprising optoelectronic transducers and configured to convert the optical output signals into the electrical output signals.

A method, comprising:

• generating electrical signals representing digital input data and kernel weights, wherein each input datum and each kernel weight is encoded across a plurality of the electrical signals;
• transmitting the electrical signals representing the digital input data and the kernel weights to a photonic integrated circuit (PIC) via electrical interconnects;
• modulating light based on the electrical signals, thereby generating optical input signals;
• and
• using an optical core within the photonic integrated circuit (PIC) to perform a multiply and accumulate (MAC) or other kernel-based operation on a first portion of the optical input signals representing the input data with a second portion of the optical input signals representing the kernel weights, thereby generating optical output signals.