Overview
The presence of microprocessors and application-specific integrated circuits (ASICs) to improve and enrich lives is pervasive. Advances in manufacturing technology continue to accelerate the opportunity to create new, exciting products. There are many critical factors in the successful development of new designs and it is estimated that well more than half the effort is spent on validation. Design verification and validation is a systematic, engineering approach that works in tandem with other critical concerns to guide the development of correct and maintainable designs. This area is also of particular interest to the Portland metro area with the corporate presence of worldwide leaders in EDA tools and microprocessor development.
PSU’s MS ECE design verification and validation track provides an opportunity for students to gain an understanding of modern designs and validation techniques used for large scale commercial designs. Courses cover topics including computer architecture, System Verilog, simulation, emulation, formal verification, pre-silicon functional validation, and post-silicon functional and electrical validation. Classes are offered in the evenings to accommodate work schedules. Many of the instructors have been recruited from the local industry.
Prerequisites
Students who begin this track should have a solid understanding of digital design, computer architecture, and hardware description languages. For example, PSU’s ECE 351 and ECE 371 would prepare students for this track.
Core
ECE 571 Intro to System Verilog for Design & Verification
ECE 585 Microprocessor System Design
ECE 593 Fundamentals of Pre-silicon Validation
ECE 595 Emulation and Functional Specification Verification
Depth and Breadth Course list
ECE 540 System On Chip Design with FPGAs
ECE 550 Post-Silicon Functional Validation
ECE 560 Assertion Based Verification
ECE 581 ASIC: Modeling and Synthesis
ECE 582 Formal Verification of Hardware/Software Systems
ECE 586 Computer Architecture
ECE 587 Advanced Computer Architecture I
ECE 590 Digital Design using Hardware Description Languages
ECE 597 Post-Silicon Electrical Validation
Track Completion Forms
Program Completion Form
Thesis Program Completion Form
Track Director