This option provides an introduction to the processes involved in the fabrication of nanoscale integrated circuits and to the computer aided design(CAD) tools necessary for the engineering of large scale systems on a chip. By selecting this option, students will learn about fault tolerance in nanoscale systems and gain an understanding of quantum phenomena in systems design.

The Option retains most of the core elements of the traditional Computer Engineering Program and contains a number of new offerings in the form of technical electives. Changes from the Traditional Computer Engineering Program occur only after second year.

New Courses in the Core of the Option

E E 453 Integrated Circuit Design (3-0-3/2): Very Large Scale Integration (VLSI) design techniques and their application. Electrical characteristics of MOSFET devices and CMOS circuits. Use of CAD tools for simulation and integrated circuit layout. Modeling delays, advanced digital logic circuit techniques, memory.

E E 456 Introduction to Nanoelectronics (3-0-0): Fundamental concepts related to current flow in nanoelectronic devices. Energy level diagram and the Fermi function. Single-energy-level model for current flow and associated effects, such as the quantum of conductance, Coulomb blockade, and single electron charging. The Schroedinger equation and quantum mechanics for applications in nanoelectronics. Matrix-equation approach for numerical band structure calculations of transistor channel materials. k-space, Brillouin zones, and density of states. Subbands for quantum wells, wires, dots, and carbon nanotubes. Current flow in nanowires and ballistic nanotransistors, including minimum possible channel resistance, quantum capacitance, and the transistor equivalent circuit under ballistic operation.

E E 459 Introduction to Nanotechnology (3-0-0): Existing micro/nanofabrication and characterization technologies including advanced nanolithography and soft lithography techniques. Overview of scanned probe microscopy techniques such as AFM, STM, and NSOM. Introduction to nanomaterials such as fullerenes, carbon nanotubes, and block copolymers. Quantum mechanical effects and properties of nanostructures. Overview of applications of nanotechnology in microelectronics, photonics and MEMS devices.

CMPE 450 Nanoscale System Design Project (1-0-6): Design of a high-performance digital system that integrates nanoscale devices onto a single solid-state substrate or assembly. Students work in teams. Fabrication of nanoscale systems will usually not be possible with the scope of a single term; however, computer-aided design tools will be used to design and verify a system short of actual fabrication. Students will gain experience with system-level specification, design and verification; design re-use strategies and alternatives; and the application of practical defect and error-tolerance techniques.

New Technical Electives

CMPE 425 Fault-Tolerant Computing (3-0-0): Defects in manufacturing, failure mechanisms, and fault modeling. Reliability and availability theory. Static and dynamic redundancy and repair. Error correcting codes and self-checking systems. Roll-back strategies. Fault-tolerant computers and network architecture. Available as a technical elective in other ECE options.

CMPE 487 Computer-Aided Design of Nanoscale Systems (3-0-3/2): Brief history of Computer-Aided Design (CAD) systems for integrated circuit design. Structure and major features of a modern CAD system. Standard cells, hard macros and soft macros. Standard cell placement and routing algorithms. The Lin-Kernighan, simulated annealing and genetic optimization algorithms for CAD. Clock tree synthesis. Logic synthesis algorithms. Technology mapping algorithms. High-level synthesis. System-on-a-chip (SoC) technology.

EE 435 Computation for Nanoengineering (3-0-0-0): Introduction to advanced numerical methods such as finite-difference, finite-element and spectral-domain techniques for solving partial differential equations. Students will learn to perform simulations of nanoscale systems involving multiphysics or coupled differential equations (involving electron and thermal transport phenomena, electrodynamics, MEMS, and process simulation), and apply graphical methods for 3D visualization of simulation data. Realistic examples will be drawn from applied areas of nanoengineering to demonstrate the use of computational methods as nanotools for understanding and gaining insights into complex physical phenomena, as well as for designing and simulating nanoscale devices and systems.