System Bits: Aug. 14


Machine-learning system determines the fewest, smallest doses that could still shrink brain tumors In an effort to improve the quality of life for patients by reducing toxic chemotherapy and radiotherapy dosing for glioblastoma, the most aggressive form of brain cancer, MIT researchers are employing novel machine-learning techniques. According to the team, glioblastoma is a malignant tumor ... » read more

Safety, Security And PPA Tradeoffs


Safety and security are emerging as key design tradeoffs as chips are added into safety-critical markets, adding even more complexity into an already complicated optimization process. In the early days of semiconductor design, performance and area were traded off against each other. Then power became important, and the main tradeoffs became power, performance and area (PPA). But as chips inc... » read more

FD-SOI Going Mainstream


Semiconductor Engineering sat down to discuss changes in the FD-SOI world and what's behind them, with James Lamb, deputy CTO for advanced semiconductor manufacturing and corporate technical fellow at Brewer Science; Giorgio Cesana, director of technical marketing at STMicroelectronics; Olivier Vatel, senior vice president and CTO at Screen Semiconductor Solutions; and Carlos Mazure, CTO at Soi... » read more

Five DAC Keynotes


The ending of Moore's Law may be about to create a new golden age for design, especially one fueled by artificial intelligence and machine learning. But design will become task-, application- and domain-specific, and will require that we think about the lifecycle of the products in a different way. In the future, we also will have to design for augmentation of experience, not just automation... » read more

System Bits: July 10


Foldable electronic switches and sensors Using inexpensive materials, UC Berkeley engineers have created a method to fabricate foldable electronic switches and sensors directly onto paper, along with prototype generators, supercapacitors and other electronic devices for what they said is a range of applications. Besides the fact that it is readily available and low cost, the team pointed ou... » read more

Wednesday At DAC 2018


Wednesday starts with a visionary talk followed by a keynote. The Visionary talk was given by Chidi Chidambaram, VP of engineering for Qualcomm, and looked at 'Challenges to Enable 5G System Scaling.' "We have to start taking a system view rather than just following technology and at the same time we have to get concerned about durability," he said. "Mobile will continue to be the leader becaus... » read more

The Growing Materials Challenge


By Katherine Derbyshire & Ed Sperling Materials have emerged as a growing challenge across the semiconductor supply chain, as chips continue to scale, or as they are utilized in new devices such as sensors for AI or machine learning systems. Engineered materials are no longer optional at advanced nodes. They are now a requirement, and the amount of new material content in chips contin... » read more

Blog Review: May 16


Synopsys' Eric Huang looks back at why the USB On-The-Go specification was revolutionary in getting devices talking to each other and how the shift to USB Type-C and Dual Mode means it isn't needed anymore. Mentor's Andrew Macleod examines four different shift-left methodologies and the benefits of each in the context of automotive and autonomous vehicle design. Cadence's Paul McLellan ch... » read more

The Week in Review: IoT


Conferences Internet of Things World 2018 takes place next week at the Santa Clara Convention Center in Silicon Valley. Executives of GE Digital, The Chamberlain Group, and UPS will be among those giving keynote addresses during the four-day conference. Monday will see pre-conference workshops, followed by three days of keynotes, presentations, and an expo floor taking in 100,000 square feet o... » read more

Power/Performance Bits: May 8


Cobalt-free cathodes Researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, built lithium-ion battery cathodes without cobalt that can store 50% more energy than traditional cobalt-containing cathodes. Currently, lithium-ion battery cathodes use layered structures, which cobalt is necessary to maintain. When lithium ions move from the cathode to anode during charging, a lot of space is left... » read more

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