The aim of this project is to configure six networked engineering workstations with high resolution color monitors, two plotters and a printer to be used as laboratory equipment in support of a course in VLSI digital and analog circuit design. The equipment will allow undergraduate electrical engineering students to model, design, and simulate and produce masks for VLSI circuits. Fabrication of the circuits through MOSIS will close the design loop: concept-design-layout-simulation-testing. The project is significant from several standpoints: (1) a laboratory with this equipment and coordinated with lectures around appropriate material will quickly teach students how to design rather than simply analyze, (2) it will be a good teaching vehicle to bring together basic scientific and engineering principles in electronics, device physics, digital systems, processing, and signal theory that are often taught independent of one another in other courses, and (3) it will remove the mystery of complex designs and be a good mechanism to inspire and build student confidence.
