Features of the current version

Features of the current version

Different levels of modeling
Different neuron models: leaky-integrate-and-fire neurons, compartmental based neurons, sigmoidal neurons. Different synapse models: static synapses and a certain model of dynamic synapses are available for spiking as well as for sigmoidal neurons. Spike time dependent synaptic plasticity is also implemented.

Easy to use Matlab interface
Since CSIM is incorporated into Matlab it is not necessary to learn any other script laguage to set up the simulation. This is all done with Matlab scripts. Furthermore the results of a simulation are directly returned as Matlab arrays and hence any plotting and analysis tools available in Matlab can easily be applied.

Object oriented design
We adopted an object oriented design for CSIM which is similar to the approaches taken in GENESIS and NEURON. That is there are objects (e.g. a LifNeuron object implements the standard leaky-integrate-and-fire model) which are interconnected by means of some signal channels. The creation of objects, the connection of objects and the setting of parameters of the objects is controlled at the level of Matlab scipts whereas the actual simulation is done in the fast C++ core.

Fast C++ core
Since CSIM is implemented in C++ and is not as general as GENESIS or NEURON simulations are performed quite fast. We also implemented some ideas from event driven simulators like SpikeNet which result on an average speedup of 3 (assuming an average firing rate of the neurons of 20Hz and short synaptic time constants) compared to a standard fixed time step simulation scheme.

Runs on Windows and Unix (Linux)
CSIM is developed on Linux but also runs under Windows XP (we have no more experience with Windows 98 yet, but it should also run there) and should in principle run on any platform for which Matlab is available.

External Interface
There is an external interface which allows CSIM to communicate with external programs. In this way one can for example control the miniature robot Khepera with CSIM . This feature is not available in the Windows version.

 
(C) 2003, Thomas Natschläger last modified 07/10/2006