The university and the department also provide a rich collection of computing facilities for the support of research and education. The laboratories and departmental computer facilities are supported by a full-time staff, including a technician, a systems manager and student help.
The VLSI Design Center is the focus of the ongoing effort to develop new and better software tools for the computer-aided design of analog and digital integrated circuits. Work at the design center makes use of graphics workstations and a variety of minic omputers and microcomputers. The design center is supported by grants and donations from local industry.
The research performed at the laser laboratory is internationally known and respected. The laboratory includes the equipment needed to design, analyze, and test many types of optical and laser systems. The lab has been supported by the National Science Foundation and local industry.
The microprocessor laboratory provides advanced tools to design, implement, and test complex microprocessor-based systems. Intel Corporation has donated over $200,000 of hardware and software for 386SX system design, in cluding six in-circuit emulators. In addition, Mentor Graphics Corporation has donated their complete set of CAD tools, allowing designs to be fully simulated and verified prior to implementation. Undergraduate and gr aduate students use the microprocessor laboratory to complete course work, projects, and research.
Portland State University's computing facilities include a variety of microcomputer laboratories with both Macintosh and PC units, an IBM 4381/12 mainframe and a Sequent Symmetry S81 with 20 processors. Centralized around a Sun 4/670MP multiprocessor machine, the Department of Electrical Engineering provides a Sun Sparc and X windows based UNIX computing environment for its faculty, staff and students, maintaining two UNIX labs for the use of all graduate students and selected undergrads. The department also shares a 28-processor Intel iPSC-2 hypercube multipr ocessor system and a 6-processor Sequent Symmetry S27 multiprocessor system with the Department of Computer Science .
A wide mix of software is available on the Departmental UNIX systems, including CAD tools from Mentor GraphicsMentor Graphics and Analogy, math software such as Maple, Mathematica and Matlab, and documentation tools, such as Interleaf and TeX. PostScript-based laser printers are a vailable to all users for the preparation of documents. Plotting and color inkjet facilities are available for specialized applications. Most research laboratories are also supported by a variety of microcomputers, UNIX workstations and special purpose sy stems.
The recently established Power Electronics Applied Research Laboratory (PEARL) features state-of-the-art instrumentation. The laboratory supports work in low-power, high-switching frequency power conversion. It is supported, in part, by local industry.
The computing facilities are interconnected via an Ethernet local area network, allowing easy access to various machines and software packages. Departmental computers are connected to NSFnet and Internet via a local connection to Northwest Net, allowing easy access to computing facilities worldwide. Electronic mail is supported via the Internet, UUCP, and BITNET.
The department's close association with local industry ensures that research laboratories contain some of the most advanced equipment available. In addition, students and faculty are often able to use laboratories at local companies when expensive, state-of-the-art equipment is required.
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