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Title

Efficient Parasitic Interconnect Insertion for Timing Analysis

Speaker

Ronald A. Rohrer (Southern Methodist University)

Abstract

Adjoint sensitivity analysis is employed efficiently to obtain the signal droop –deviation from ideal response—caused by parasitic interconnect among gates. A linear analog inertial delayed Elmore Delay digital gate macromodel used in conjunction with the above renders efficient overall timing analysis.

Biography

One of the preeminent researchers in electronic design automation, Ron Rohrer’s contributions to improving integrated circuit (IC) production span over 50 years. Rohrer realized early on that circuit simulation was crucial to all aspects of IC design, and introduced a sequence of projects in courses at UC Berkeley that evolved into SPICE, now the industry standard for IC simulation. Decades later at Carnegie Mellon University, he introduced the Asymptotic Waveform Evaluation (AWE) algorithm, which enabled efficient timing simulation of ICs containing extremely large numbers of parasitic elements.

He is a legendary inventor, author & co-author of 5 patents, 5 textbooks and more than 100 technical papers. He was founding editor of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) Transactions on Computer-Aided Design of Integrated Circuits and Systems from 1981-1984 and President of the Circuits and Systems Society of the IEEE in 1987. Rohrer was made Fellow, IEEE in 1980, and inducted into the National Academy of Engineering in 1989. He has served on numerous AIEE, IEEE, NAE and US Government committees.

His contributions to the field have also been acknowledged by major awards, including the IEEE Kirchhoff Award in 2012, the IEEE CAS Belevitch Award in 2009, the EDAC Phil Kaufman Award in 2002, the NEC Corp. C&C Prize in 1996, the IEEE Education Medal in 1993, and the SRC Technical Excellence Award in 1991, the IEEE CAS Van Valkenburg Award in 1990, the SRC Inventor Recognition Award in 1990, and the ASEE Terman Award in 1978. Rohrer was granted the Senior Humboldt Fellowship, RWTH, Aachen from1972-1973, and four other acknowledgements for prize papers between 1967 and1991.

In addition to his academic career, he has been involved in over a dozen start-ups and has held executive positions in publicly traded companies. Rohrer is currently the Cecil & Ida Green Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering in the Lyle School of Engineering at Southern Methodist University’s (SMU).