Dr. Drost is a Senior Distinguished Engineer in Sun Microsystems Laboratories. His research interests include high-speed clocking, data communication, 3-D chip technologies, energy-efficient on-chip data communication and computation, and asynchronous timing of computer systems.
Robert Drost received his B.S. and M.S. in Electrical Engineering in 1993 and Ph.D. degree in Electrical Engineering with a Ph.D. minor in Computer Science in 2001, all from Stanford University.
Dr. Drost joined Sun Microsystems in 1993, worked on processor projects, and since 1995 has been a member of the research staff at Sun Microsystems Laboratories, now in Menlo Park, California. He is the Principal Investigator of communication circuit research and his current research focuses on high bandwidth chip-to-chip communication. This research encompasses high-speed clocking, data communication, and 3-D chip technologies with the goal to remove the disparity between on-chip performance and off-chip data bandwidth. His other areas of interest include energy-efficient on-chip data communication and computation, and asynchronous timing of computer systems. Dr. Drost received the Sun Microsystems Chairman's Award for Innovation in 2004, and he holds 36 U.S. patents in the field of electronic circuits.
In 2004, Robert was named as one of MIT's Top 100 Technology Innovators of the Year. He also shared, with Ivan Sutherland, an R&D 100 Award for the same year.
Education:
* PhD Electrical Engineering & Computer Science 2001, Stanford University
* BS Electrical Engineering, Stanford University
* MS Electrical Engineering 1993, Stanford University
Publications
R. Drost, B. Wooley, An 8-Gbps/pin Simultaneously Bidirectional Transceiver in 0.35-micron CMOS, IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits, in press.
R. Drost, R. D. Hopkins, R. Ho, I. Sutherland, Proximity Communication, IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits, in press.
R. Ho, J. Gainsley, R. Drost,
Long Wires and Asynchronous Control, IEEE Asynchronous Circuits and Systems Symposium, Apr. 2004.
R. Drost, R. Ho, R. D. Hopkins, I. Sutherland, Electronic Alignment for Proximity Com-munication, IEEE Int'l Solid-State Circuits Conference, Feb. 2004.
R. Drost, R. D. Hopkins, I. Sutherland, Proximity Communications, IEEE Custom Integrated Circuits Conference, pp. 469-472, Sept. 2003.
H. Hatamkhani, K-L. J. Wong, R. Drost, C-K. K. Yang, A 10-mW 3.6-Gbps I/O Transmitter, IEEE VLSI Circuits Symposium, pp. 97-98, June 2003.
W. Coates, R. Drost, Congestion and Starvation Detection in Ripple FIFOs, IEEE Asynchronous Circuits and Systems Symposium, pp. 36-45, May 2003.
S. Bardwaj, S.S. Mohan, R. Drost, B.T. Khuri-Yakub, K. Saraswat, In-situ Film Thickness and Temperature Monitoring Using a 2 GHz Acoustic Phase Measurement System, IEEE Ultrasonics Symposium, pp. 965-967, Dec. 1991.
Selected Articles
"New Sun Microsystems Chip May Unseat the Circuit Board," New York Times, Sept. 22, 2003.
"Look Ma, No Wires," IEEE Spectrum, Nov. 12, 2003.
"An eye toward the future," Test and Measurement World, Nov 1, 2003.
"7 Hot Projects," MIT Technology Review, Dec. 2003/Jan. 2004.
Interests
Training and competing in Triathlons Cultivating Orchids Travel Aviation
