Message from the Director

The Center for Silicon System Implementation (CSSI) is focused on all aspects of integrated system design and manufacturing that spans from network-on-a-chip architectures to self-adaptable analog and digital circuits, to ultra low-power nano devices, bio chips, and the CAD methodologies that enable them. Our 18 faculty researchers span several Carnegie Mellon departments that include Electrical & Computer Engineering, Computer Science and Mechanical Engineering. Currently, the center has over 80 graduate students working in or across various areas that include manufacturing, circuits, systems and other emerging technologies. Founded in 2000, CSSI builds on over 25 years of experience in the electronic design automation industry that began with a sustaining grant from the Semiconductor Research Corporation. Today our research is supported by the U.S. government, various consortiums and industry.

We have active research collaborations with dozens of companies and institutions from all over the world and graduates from the center are well positioned in both industry and academia. We encourage you to explore our website and to identify areas of potential engagement as either a new industrial affiliate or student researcher.

CSSI is housed on the 2nd and 3rd floors of Hamerschlag Hall and enjoys state-of-the-art compute, conference and office facilities.

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Manufacturing

This area focuses on the process and product design for the newest technology nodes, i.e., 45nm and below, in which optical lithography is reaching fundamental limits. The goal is to optimize multiple objectives such as performance, leakage, power dissipation and finally yield and reliability. New approaches to ensure manufacturability by co-optimizing device design, layout and manufacturing process, and test/diagnosis are being investigated.

Circuits

This area focuses on the design, optimization and implementation of the next generation of analog, RF, mixed-signal and digital integrated circuits. The goal is to provide solutions for the every increasing need for higher integration, and higher performance while at the same time addressing the challenges presented by modern nanometer CMOS processes, in particular higher leakage power and device variation.

Systems

This area focuses on tools and design methodologies for modeling, analysis, and optimization of critical design constraints (performance, power, reliability, etc.) at the system and architecture level. With the increased need for addressing challenges due to more on-chip complexity, communication and power costs, and design variability, new design aids are essential very early in the design process. Research in this area targets scalable performance, power and reliability modeling, and associated novel design paradigms for dealing with on-chip communication, power management, and variability-aware design.

Emerging

This area focuses on the fabrication technologies and design methodologies for emerging areas that take advantage of the classical deposit-pattern-etch cycles inherent to integrated circuit manufacturing. A wide range of technologies are being investigated ranging from nano-technologies such as molecular transistor based circuits and spin-based devices and circuits to multi-physics devices and circuits such as those found in MEMS, electro-chemical applications, biochips and lab-on-chip devices.