Faculty:

David Z. Pan
Professor

Research Admin:

Postdoctoral researchers:

You Li
Joined in Summer 2025

Xiaohan Gao
Joined in Summer 2025

Graduate students:

Shupeng Ning (co-supervised with Prof. Ray Chen)
Joined in Fall 2021

Chen-Hao Hsu
Joined in Fall 2022

Souradip Poddar
Joined in Fall 2022

Zhili Xiong
Joined in Spring 2023

Seunggeun Kim
Joined in Fall 2023

Yang Hsu
Joined in Fall 2024

Chin-Yi Cheng
Joined in Summer 2025

BingYang Liu
Joined in Fall 2025

Vivek Varier (co-advised by Prof. Nan Sun)

Conner Liu
(part-time at Meta)
Joined in Fall 2024

Ze Xu
(part-time at Ampere)
Joined in Fall 2024

Chuanqi Chen
(part-time at KLA)
Joined in Spring 2026

Undergraduate students:

Visiting Scholars/Students:

PhD Alumni, first job after PhD and current job + selected honors:

1. Hanqing Zhu (PhD 01/2026, co-supervised by Prof. Ray Chen), Member of Technical Staff, xAI (ML and Systems Rising Star 2025; MLSys 2025 Outstanding Paper Honorable Mention; CVPR 2025 AI4CC Workshop Best Paper Award; Texas ECE Graduate Achievement Award 2024; 1st Place in IEEE/ACM MLCAD FPGA Macro-Placement Contest MLCAD 2023; Robert Hilbert Memorial Optical Design Winner 2022)
2. Hyunsu Chae (PhD 05/2025), Postdoc Researcher, UT Austin (Cadence Women in Technology Scholarship in 2023)
3. Rachel S. Rajarathnam (PhD 12/2024), Senior Staff Software Engineer, AMD (Cadence Women in Technology Scholarship in 2021)
4. Ahmet F.Budak (PhD 08/2023), Staff Research Engineer, Analog Devices (ADI Outstanding Student Design Award 2021)
5. Venkata Suresh Rayudu (PhD 08/2023, co-supervised by Prof. Ranjit Gharpurey), Technical Product Manager, Silicon Labs
6. Zixuan Jiang (PhD 07/2023), Software Engineer, Google Core ML, Google
7. Hao Chen (PhD 05/2023), Software Engineer, X, the moonshot factory [Google X] (NVIDIA Graduate Fellowship 2022)
8. Chenghao Feng (PhD 05/2023, co-supervised with Prof. Ray Chen), Senior Silicon Photonics Design Engineer, Alpine Optoelectronics (Robert Hilbert Memorial Optical Design Winner 2022)
9. Jiaqi Gu (PhD 05/2023, co-supervised by Prof. Ray Chen). Assistant Professor, Dept. of Electrical, Computer, and Energy Engineering, Arizona State University (ASPDAC 2020 Best Paper Award; ACM SRC Grand Finals First Place 2021; IEEE TCAD Donald O. Pederson Best Paper Award 2021; Robert Hilbert Memorial Optical Design Winner 2022; UT-ECE Jacome Dissertation Prize 2023)
10. Mingjie Liu (PhD 11/2022), Research Scientist, Nvidia
11. Ki Yong Kim (PhD 07/2022, co-supervised by Prof. Ranjit Gharpurey), Principal Engineer, Samsung Electronics, Suwon, South Korea
12. Keren Zhu (PhD 07/2022), Postdoc Researcher, UT Austin; Now research assistant professor at CSE Dept., Chinese University of Hong Kong
13. Wei Shi (PhD 05/2022, co-supervised by Prof. Nan Sun), Research Scientist, Meta
14. Miguel Francisco Gandara (PhD 05/2021, co-supervised by Prof. Nan Sun), Staff Engineer, MediaTek
15. Sungjin Hong (PhD 05/2021, co-supervised by Prof. Nan Sun), Analog/Mixed-Signal Design Engineer, Uhnder
16. Mohamed Baker Alawieh (PhD 12/2020), Senior R&D Engineer, Synopsys (ISPD'20 Best Paper Award)
17. Wei Ye (PhD 05/2020), Research Scientist, Facebook On-Device AI (Cadence Women in Technology Scholarship in 2018, ISPD'20 Best Paper Award, EDAA 2022 Outstanding Dissertation Award)
18. Zheng Zhao (PhD 05/2020, co-supervised by Prof. Ray Chen), Senior Software Engineer, Synopsys (Cadence Women in Technology Scholarship in 2019)
19. Zhoufeng Ying (PhD 05/2020, co-supervised with Prof. Ray Chen), Senior Silicon Photonics Designer, Alpine Optoelectronics
20. Shounak Dhar (PhD 08/2019), SoC Design Engineer, Intel; now SMTS at AMD (DAC'19 Best Paper Award, ISPD 2016 Contest First Place)
21. Wuxi Li (PhD 08/2019), Staff Software Engineer, Xilinx; now SMTC at AMD (DAC'19 Best Paper Award, Silver Medal of ACM/SIGDA Student Research Competition 2018, ISPD 2017 and 2016 Contests First Place)
22. Joydeep Mitra (PhD 05/2019), Senior Software Architect, Cadence; now Senior Distinguished Machine Learning Engineer at Capital One
23. Biying Xu (PhD 05/2019), Lead Software Engineer, Cadence (Cadence Women in Technology Scholarship in 2018, 2015 CADathlon at ICCAD Third Place)
24. Meng Li (PhD 08/2018), Research Scientist, Facebook Reality Lab; now Assistant Professor, Peking University (First Place of ACM Student Research Competition Grand Finals 2018; GLSVLSI'18 Best Paper Award; Gold Medal of ACM/SIGDA Student Research Competition 2017; HOST'17 Best Paper Award)
25. Derong Liu (PhD 08/2018), Lead Software Engineer, Cadence Design Systems (ISPD'18 Best Paper Award)
26. Yibo Lin (PhD 05/2018), Postdoc Researcher, UT Austin; now Assistant Professor at Peking University (UT Graduate Continuing Fellowship 2017; SPIE'16 Franco Cerrina Memorial Best Student Paper Award)
27. Jiaojiao Ou (PhD 2018), R&D Engineer, Synopsys; now Sr. Staff R&D Engineer at Synopsys (2017 SPIE BACUS Scholarship)
28. Xiaoqing Xu (PhD 2017), Senior Research Engineer, ARM Research; now Software Engineer at Google X (Gold Medal at Design Automation Student Research Competition by ACM SIGDA 2016; Best in Session Award by SRC TECHCON 2015)
29. Subhendu Roy (PhD 2015), Principal Software Engineer, now Software Architect at Cadence Design Systems (ISPD 2014 Best Paper Award; TexasWISE 2014 Best Student Poster Award)
30. Yilin Zhang (PhD 2014), Software Scientist, Rocket Fuel Inc.; now Software Engineer, Google
31. Bei Yu (PhD 2014), Postdoc, UT Austin; now Associate Professor at CSE Dept., Chinese University of Hong Kong. (EDAA Outstanding Dissertation Award, ICCAD'13 Best Paper Award, ASPDAC'12 Best Paper Award, 2013 Chinese Government Award for Outstanding Self-Financed Students Abroad, 2013/2012 ICCAD CAD Contest 2nd Place Awards, Silver Medal in ACM Student Research Contest, SPIE Optics and Photonics Education Scholarship, 2012 IBM Ph.D. Scholarship)
32. Jiwoo Pak (PhD 2014), Senior Member of Technical Staff, now Software Architect at Cadence (SRC Techcon 2012 Best in Session Award, 2013 Grace Hopper Celebration Scholarship)
33. Jhih-Rong (Jerrica) Gao (PhD 2014), Senior Member of Technical Staff, Cadence; now Senior Principal Software Developer at Flex Logix. (ICCAD'13 Best Paper Award, ICCAD'12 and ICCAD'13 CAD Contest Awards, SPIE 2013 Scholarship)
34. Samuel Ward (PhD 2013): Data Scientist, now Director of Machine Learning, Apple (IBM Master Inventor in 2011)
35. Duo Ding (PhD 2011): Sr. Hardware Engineer, Oracle Microelectronics. Now Senior Staff Software Engineer, Samsung (2013 ACM Outstanding PhD Dissertation Award in EDA; 2012 ASPDAC Best Paper Award; 2009 ICICDT Best Student Paper Award)
36. Yongchan (James) Ban (PhD 2011): Sr. Software Engineer, Intel; now Senior Director of Engineering, Synopsys (2010 SPIE Education Scholarship)
37. Jae-seok Yang (PhD 2011): Senior Engineer, Samsung; now Director Software Engineering at Cadence (2010 ASPDAC Best Paper Award; IBM Research 2010 Pat Goldberg Memorial Best Paper Award)
38. Wooyoung Jang (PhD 2011): Senior Engineer, Samsung; now Associate Professor at Dankook University, South Korea (2006-2011 Samsung Scholarship)
39. Ashutosh Chakraborty (PhD 2010): Senior Hardware Engineer, Oracle Microelectronics; now Software Engineer, Google (2009 DATE Best Paper/IP Award; 2009-10 UT Graduate School Continuing Fellowship; 2009 eASIC Placement Contest 1st Prize)
40. Kun Yuan (PhD 2010): Sr. Member of Technical Staff, Cadence Design Systems; Now Senior Software Engineer, Airbnb (ISPD'11 Best Paper Award; IBM Research 2010 Pat Goldberg Memorial Best Paper Award)
41. Sean Xiaokang Shi (PhD 2009): Component Engineer, Intel; now Bloomberg LP (2009 IBM PhD Scholarship)
42. Peng Yu (PhD 2009): Postdoc at Baylor College of Medicine; then Tenure-Track Assistant Professor at Texas A&M; now Professor at West China Hospital(2008-09 UT Graduate School Continuing Fellowship; 2008 SPIE Education Scholarship; 2008 SRC Inventor Recognition Award)
43. Anand Rajaram (PhD 2008): Member of Consulting Staff, Magma Design Automation - acquired by Synopsys; now Principal Engineer at NVidia
44. Minsik Cho (PhD 2008): Research Staff Member, IBM T. J. Watson Research Center. Now at Apple (ISPD'13 Best Paper Award; IBM Research 2010 Pat Goldberg Memorial Best Paper Award; 2008 SRC Inventor Recognition Award; 2007 IBM PhD Scholarship; ISPD'07 Global Routing Contest Awards)
45. Tao Luo (PhD 2007): Sr. Member of Technical Staff at Magma DA; now Uber. (2007 SRC Techcon Best Paper in Session)
46. Anand Ramalingam (PhD 2007): Member of Consulting Staff at Magma DA - acquired by Synopsys
47. Gang Xu (PhD 2007): Sr. R&D Engineer at Mentor Graphics; now with Google
48. Haoxing Ren (PhD 2006): Research Staff Member at IBM T. J. Watson Research Center; Now Director of Design Automation Research, Nvidia (IEEE Fellow class of 2024)

Post-Doc Alumni, first job after post-doc and current job:

1. Hyunsu Chae (postdoc 06/2025-11/2025), Lead Software Engineer, Cadence
2. Supriyo Maji (postdoc 05/2023-03/2025), Staff Engineer, Analog Devices Inc. (ADI)
3. Keren Zhu (postdoc 07/2022-03/2023), Research assistant professor at CSE Dept., Chinese University of Hong Kong
4. Shuhan Zhang (postdoc 07/2021-12/2022)
5. Xiyuan Tang (postdoc 09/2019-05/2021), Assistant Professor at EECS and Institute for Artificial Intelligence, Peking University
6. Arman Roohi (postdoc 08/2019 - 07/2020), Assistant professor at department of computer science and engineering, University of Nebraska - Lincoln
7. Shaolan Li (postdoc 06/2018 - 07/2019), Assistant Professor at Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology
8. Yibo Lin (postdoc 06/2018 - 06/2019), Assistant Professor at Department of Computer Science and Center for Energy-Efficient Computing and Applications (CECA), Peking University
9. Bei Yu (postdoc 08/2014 - 07/2015), Assistant Professor at Department of Computer Science and Engineering, Chinese University of Hong Kong

MS Alumni with Thesis or Report:

• Yu-Kang Lin (MS in May 2025), NVIDIA
• Yunfei Sun (MS in May 2021), Apple
• Jagmohan Singh (MS in August 2013), Cadence
• Yang Li (MS in August 2013)
• Suhail Ahmed, Samsung Austin R&D Center
• Wen (Rein) Zhang (M.S. in August 2012): Hardware Engineer at Oracle
• Boyang Zhang (M.S. in May 2012): Hardware Engineer at Oracle
• Yilin Zhang (M.S. in May 2010): Design Engineer at Marvell 2010-2011. Continued to pursue PhD at UT
• Anurag Kumar (M.S. in Dec 2009): Cadence (2009 eASIC Placement Contest 1st Prize)
• Kiwoon Kim, Principal Member of Technical Staff, Freescale
• Tony Quan (M.S. in Dec 2009): IBM
• Katrina Lu (M.S. in Dec. 2008), Intel (SRC Master's Scholarship)
• Duo Ding (M.S. 2008): Continued to pursue PhD at UT
• Ashutosh Chakraborty (M.S. in May 2008): Continued to pursue PhD at UT
• Varsha Dadlani (M.S. in May 2008): Cisco
• Emiliano Lozano (MS in May 2008): IBM
• Andy Havlir (M.S. in Dec. 2005): AMD
• Jun Liu (M.S. in Aug. 2005): AMD

BS and REU Alumni:

• Joshua Gnanayutham
• Saanika Kenkare
• Rohan Tanna
• Miranda M. Pacheco
• August Shi: Now Assistant Professor at UT Austin
• Michael Booker
• Doug Ilijev
• Marc Anthony Gonzalez (B.S. 2011), IBM
• Dhruv Mehrotra (B.S. in Jan. 2004): Magma Design Automation (now Business Development Manager at Google)
  

Visiting Scholars/Students Alumni:

• Ziming Wei (Peking University), July 2025 to Sept 2025
• Yuan Pu (Chinese University of Hong Kong), February 2025 to July 2025
• Ziyi Wang (Chinese University of Hong Kong), December 2024 to May 2025
• Yao Lai (University of Hong Kong), February to July 2024
• Guojin Chen (Chinese University of Hong Kong), Aug. 2023 to May 20244
• Gi Moon Hong (SK Hynix), Aug. 2023 to July 2024
• Jing Chen (Nanjing University of Posts and Telecommunications), July. 2018 to Sept. 2020
• Prof. Jae-Joon Kim (Pohang University of Science and Technology), Sept. 2019 to Aug. 2020
• Prof. Wooyoung Jang (Dankook University), Jan. 2019 to Feb. 2020
• Prof. Wei Hu (Xidian University), Dec. 2018 to Dec. 2019
• Prof. Kun Ren (Hangzhou Dianzi University), Oct. 2018 to Sep. 2019
• Ying Chen (Institute of Microelectronics of Chinese Academy of Sciences), Oct. 2017 to Mar. 2019
• Meng Liu (Institute of Automation, Chinese Academy of Sciences), Feb. 2018 to Dec. 2018
• Prof. Zhiguo Yu (Jiangnan University), Dec. 2017 to Dec. 2018
• Prof. Hui Xu (Anhui University of Science & Technology), Oct. 2017 to Oct. 2018
• Jun Zhang (Nanjing University of Posts and Telecommunications), Nov. 2016 to Nov. 2017
• Prof. Peiyong Zhang (Zhejiang University), Nov. 2016 to Nov. 2017
• Prof. Jun Liu (Hefei University of Technology), Nov. 2016 to Nov. 2017
• Zhijian Pan (Tsinghua University), Oct. 2016 to Apr. 2017
• Prof. Ronghua Jiang (Sichuan University), Mar. 2016 to Mar. 2017
• Taiki Kimura (Toshiba, Japan), May 2015 to Oct. 2016
• Vinicius Livramento (Federal University of Santa Catarina, Brazil), Jan. 2016 to Jul. 2016
• Wei Ye (Zhejiang University, China), July to Dec., 2014
• Dr. Junhyung Um (Samsung Electronics - System LSI, S. Korea), Jan. 2014 to Dec. 2014
• Dr. Tetsuaki Matsunawa (Toshiba, Japan), Oct. 2013 to April, 2015
• Prof. Weifeng Lv (Hangzhou Dianzi University, China), Sept. 1 2013 to Feb. 28, 2014
• Yen-Hung Lin (National Chiao Tung University), Mar. 1 to Dec. 1, 2011 (now TSMC)
• Shanhu Shen (Zhejiang University): Synopsys
• Tung-Chieh (Donnie) Chen (National Taiwan University): SpringSoft (now R&D Manager at Synopsys)
• Ou He (Tsinghua University): IBM China Research Lab