Places to get information about current topics of research in computer architecture or VLSI design?

[Special K]

If this isn't considered HT enough then please move it, but I decided to post it here because I think that the people who could best help with this question usually frequent the HT forum.

Here is my situation: I want to apply for a scholarship specifically aimed at science and engineering students. The application requires an essay in which you basically explain what your career goals are, and also discuss a specific problem in your field that you would like to address through your studies, research, jobs, etc. The problem is I don't know at the moment a specific field or problem that I want to address. I am just now taking comp. arch. I and definitely know I want to be involved in some aspect of processor/VLSI design, but am not sure which one. I plan to do research next spring but that will be too late for this applcation.

Other than just reading research pages from universities and company websites such as intel, does anyone have any other advice to give me on how to define a career/research goal? (Maybe I just answered my own question here)

 

[Lynx516]

First of all you need to decide whether you are going to do any electronics stuff or just architecture design. If you want to do the electronics side of things you might want to look at clock slew problems and also some of the stuff about the processes behind CPUs and teh problems affecting them i.e. leakage current. If you want to do architecture look indepth at current architecture and find out ways that it looses performance it doesnt matter if you cannot solve them

 

[f95toli]

Try looking up papers from conferences, there are usually a few papers (from invited speakers) on topics like "current trends in..." which deals with trends, important problems etc.
You should be able to find conference proceedings online but you might have to access them from a research library.

 

[CanOWorms]

Why don't you go to a library and look through IEEE journals?

I doubt they would think that you could go really in-depth. I'm surprised you even have heard of VLSI design.

As for VLSI, the important metrics are things like cost, functionality, robustness, energy/power dissipation, performance. Maybe you can pick something (like interconnect wires) and relate it to those or pick one and talk about it.

 

[sgtroyer]

Take a look at the IEEE Transactions on VLSI Systems. Any good engineering library should have it.

 

[vinosuaf]

You might want to look through some other journals too. IBM's research division publishes two journals that you can find online. Their systems journal talks about some interesting things and problems that exist. Depending on what exactly in design you want to do is going to determine more closely which journals to look in. In general I'd agree that the IEEE journals work, some of the MRS conference proceedings may also help you.

 

[Special K]

Thanks for the suggestions everyone. I have decided to pursue quantum computer architectures for now. The only problem is that I am having a hard time defining exactly what it is I want to do in research. It seems like I shouldn't be capable of specifically laying out a plan of research this early, having not even completed undergrad. yet...