ELEC 7770

Advanced VLSI Design

Spring 2016
Introduction
Vishwani D. Agrawal
James J. Danaher Professor
ECE Department, Auburn University
Auburn, AL 36849
vagrawal@eng.auburn.edu
http://www.eng.auburn.edu/~vagrawal/COURSE/E7770_Spr16
Spring 2016, Jan 13 ELEC 7770: Advanced VLSI Design (Agrawal) 1
 Related Course: VLSI Design
ELEC 5770/6770: Review of MOS transistor
fundamentals, CMOS logic circuits; VLSI
fabrication and design rules; clocking strategies
and sequential design; performance estimation;
memories and programmable arrays; standard
cell design methodologies; computer aided
design (CAD) tools.

Spring 2016, Jan 13 ELEC 7770: Advanced VLSI Design (Agrawal) 2

 Related Course: Computer-Aided
Design of Digital Circuits
ELEC 5250/6250: Hardware components of
multiprocessor systems including processor,
interconnection, memory, and control
architectures; Software elements of parallel
processing including inter-processor
communication, task partitioning, task mapping
and scheduling, load balancing, programming
languages, and parallel algorithms.

Spring 2016, Jan 13 ELEC 7770: Advanced VLSI Design (Agrawal) 3

 Related Course: Low-Power Design of
Electronic Circuits
ELEC 5270/6270: Design of digital circuits and
systems for reduced power consumption, power
analysis algorithms, low-power MOS
technologies, low-power design architectures for
FPGA, memory and microprocessor, reduction
of power in testing of circuits.

Spring 2016, Jan 13 ELEC 7770: Advanced VLSI Design (Agrawal) 4

 Related Course: VLSI Testing
ELEC 7250: Introduction to VLSI testing, test
process and automatic test equipment, test
economics and product quality, fault modeling,
logic and fault simulation, testability measures,
combinational and sequential circuit test
generation, memory test, analog test, delay test,
IDDQ test, design for testability, built-in self-test,
boundary scan, analog test bus, system test and
core test.

Spring 2016, Jan 13 ELEC 7770: Advanced VLSI Design (Agrawal) 5

 Related Course: Digital System Design

ELEC 4200: Hierarchical, modular design of

digital systems; computer-aided digital system
modeling, simulation, analysis, and synthesis;
design implementation with programmable logic
devices and field programmable gate arrays.

Spring 2016, Jan 13 ELEC 7770: Advanced VLSI Design (Agrawal) 6

 This Course: Advanced VLSI Design

ELEC 7770: Review of CMOS logic circuits;

impact of fabrication issues on design; high
speed switching circuits; high performance
memory structures; advanced clocking
strategies and clock distribution; performance
optimization; deep submicron design issues;
ASIC design flow: logic synthesis, placement
and routing; design verification; low power
design.

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 Course Objectives and Evaluation
Objectives:
Learn and participate in the process of modern VLSI
design, verification, and test of a chip.
Develop an understanding for the advanced design
concepts in modern VLSI technologies.
Evaluation:
Project 35%
Homework 30%
Final exam, May 4, 2016, B235, 4-6:30PM 35%

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 Course Outline
Design Project
Advanced Topics
Economics of VLSI systems
Logic synthesis and technology mapping
Retiming and timing optimization
Soft errors and fault tolerance
Signal integrity
Verification
RF testing, alternate test, defect level, optimization
Technologies of the future (reading assignments)

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 Reference Books
J. M. Rabaey, A. Chandrakasan, and B. Nikoli,
Digital Integrated Circuits, A Design Perspective,
Second Edition, Prentice-Hall, 2003.
M. J. S. Smith, Application-Specific Integrated
Circuits, Addison-Wesley, 1997.
N. H. E. Weste and D. Harris, CMOS VLSI
Design, A Circuits and Systems Perspective,
Third Edition, Addison-Wesley, 2005.
W. Wolf, Modern VLSI Design, System-on-Chip
Design, Third Edition, Prentice-Hall, 2002.

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 VLSI Realization Process
Customers need

Determine requirements Design

Write specifications

Design synthesis and Verification

Test development
Fabrication
Manufacturing test
Manufacture
Chips to customer
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 Defining Terms
Design synthesis: Given an I/O function, develop a
procedure to manufacture a device using known
materials and processes.
Verification: Predictive analysis to ensure that the
synthesized design, when manufactured, will
perform the given I/O function.
Test:
Characterization: A test that debugs test program by fault
diagnosis.
Manufacturing test: A step that ensures that the physical
device, manufactured from the synthesized design, has
no manufacturing defect.
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 VLSI Design & Test Seminar Series

Must attend
Every Wednesday, Broun 235, 4PM

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