CIDR Wiki Home Page

The Center for Integrated Circuit and Device Research (CIDR) is a DOST-funded infrastructure and framework for the sharing of resources between the academe, industry, and government, with the goal of reducing the risk of bringing new technologies from discovery to commercialization. Specifically, sharing resources that enable (1) graduate-level manpower development, (2) technology exploration, and (3) increased technology absorption capabilities, leading to increased economic competitiveness and a sustainable local IC design ecosystem. In order to enable these goals and address the accompanying issues associated with these goals, CIDR’s efforts will revolve around and emphasize collaborative activities, specifically joint development of manpower and technologies.

The CIDR Innovation Infrastructure

CIDR Overview and Roadmap

The CIDR innovation infrastructure enables joint ecosystem development designed to produce and maintain a critical mass of graduate-level IC designers, and reduce the risk in technology development and adoption via these components:

1. Conducting joint graduate-level programs,
2. Pursuing collaborative applied research projects, and
3. Creating a network of Mirror Laboratories.

Mirror Laboratories

The Mirror Laboratories serves as the infrastructure platform for participating in joint graduate programs and training, and/or collaborative applied research work. Using the CIDR Mirror Laboratories as a platform, and leveraging various technologies for remote learning, the center conducts Joint Classes and Graduate Programs specifically on IC design and related fields for the academe, industry, and government, aimed at creating and sustaining a critical mass of graduate-level IC designers.

Collaborative Applied Research

The Collaborative Applied Research activities of the center is realized as component projects. Each project builds on a "linchpin" fundamental technology, and explore solutions to real-world problems facing in key application areas. Identifying these critical "linchpin" technologies is a key element in all CIDR research projects, efficiently leveraging the same technology expertise to solve a range of problems in various applications.

Component Research Projects

• Energy-Efficient RF Front-end Architectures for Large-Scale Sensor Networks

Explores asymmetric radio frequency (RF) circuit topologies and system architectures for very low-power wireless sensor nodes running purely on harvested energy. By combining impulse radio (IR) ultra-wideband (UWB) transmitters (Tx) with on-off keying (OOK) energy detection receivers (Rx), we expect significant reduction in the overall energy requirements of the entire radio front-end transceiver (TxRx). This would potentially enable a wide variety of sensor and internet-of-things (IoT) applications in severely energy-starved environments.

• Model-Driven Co-Design of MEMS-Based Sensors and Interface Circuits

Explores the interaction between MEMS-based sensors and their corresponding interface circuits, as well as formulate an effective way of co-designing and co-simulating both technologies. To do this, the project will have three major activities: (1) develop and verify analytical models of MEMS-based sensors through fabrication and characterization, (2) develop and verify behavioral models of FDSOI-based interface circuits through fabrication (via foundry) and testing, and (3) formulation of co-design and co-simulation methodology for the sensors and interface circuits.

• Energy Efficient Machine Learning Hardware Co-design

Tackles the co-design of energy-efficient machine learning algorithms and hardware. Methodologies to integrate machine learning on-chip for distributed data processing, network lifespan improvement and security will be explored. These methodologies will likewise pave the way for automated hardware generation for the accelerator needed to perform these tasks.

• Energy Harvesting for Battery-less IoT Device Operation

Explores a battery-less IoT device through multiple energy harvesting technologies. The environmental, economic, and logistical issue of battery replacement in the deployment of millions of IoT devices can be solved by utilizing super-cap instead of batteries. One possible solution for realizing these battery-less IoT devices is through multiple energy harvesting with design optimization of the circuit power consumption. Moreover, this project aimed to develop a customize and reconfigurable power management integrated circuit (IC) designed chip with different energy harvesting technologies; a combined or stand-alone energy harvesting unit (e.g., light, thermal, and RF sources), depending on the application of the wireless sensor node (WSN) or IoT device.

Activities

• Classes
• Technical Talks
• Modular Open Source Analog Integrated Circuit (MOSAIC) Community
• SEACAS Chipathon 2023
• NSTW 2024 (exhibit video)

Partners

Academe

Institution	Collaborators
University of the Philippines Diliman Microelectronics and Microprocessors Lab (MICROLAB) -- UP EEEI	Louis Alarcon Maria Theresa De Leon Anastacia Alvarez Richard Hizon Marc Rosales Ryan Antonio
Mindanao State University - Iligan Institute of Technology MSU-IIT Microelectronics Laboratory	Jefferson Hora
Ateneo de Manila University	Gian Mayuga Toto Oppus
Batangas State University	Gil Barte Ralph Gerard Sangalang
Caraga State University	Re-ann Calimpusan
Caraga State University Cabadbaran	Thesa Ll. Vergara
De La Salle University	Anne Dulay Roderick Yap
Mindanao State University - Marawi	Sihawi Khalid
Surigao del Norte State University	Vrian Jay Ylaya
University of San Carlos	Ellen Agnes Zafra Luis Gerardo Canete
University of Santo Tomas	Angelito Silverio
University of Science and Technology of Southern Philippines	Ace Virgil Villaruz
University of the Philippines Los Baños	John Paul Ramoso

Industry

Company	Collaborators
Analog Devices General Trias	Miles Ramirez Sherwin Almazan
Center for Applied Microelectronics and Programming	Christian Roque
Embedded Silicon Technology Solutions	Robert Minguez II
Lattice Semiconductor	John Imperial
Marquee Semiconductor	Michael Fernandez
ROHM LDP	Samuel Molines
Xinyx Design	Charade Avondo Agnes Oh

Government

Institution	Collaborators
Advanced Science and Technology Institute	Franz De Leon
Philippine Space Agency	Joel Marciano Jr. Marc Talampas