structures, and to explore hybrid chips where silicon CMOS devices are combined with new-frontier devices such as carbon nanotubes, organic semiconductors, or quantum-effect devices. The Focus Center is led by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The other participating universities are Cornell; Princeton; Purdue; Stanford; SUNY Albany; University of California at Berkeley and Los Angeles; UT Austin; and University of Virginia

The Center for Circuits, Systems & Software (C2S2) Focus Center was formed in 2001 to develop a wholly new generation of design techniques to convert semiconductor circuits into ultra-performance electronic products. Tomorrow’s circuits must routinely move billions of bits per second through the air; perform billions of operations per milliwatt; access billions of bits of on-chip storage; and interact with a rich environment of communicating electrical, mechanical, optical, and biological systems. To convert tomorrow’s transistors into this range of required performance requires a revolutionary rethinking of today’s design strategies. The C2S2 Focus Center, led by Carnegie Mellon University, is exploring a variety of approaches to these problems. The other universities in this consortium are Cornell, Columbia, MIT, Princeton, Stanford, University of California at Berkeley, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, University of Michigan, and University of Washington.