Parallel Circuit Simulation: A Historical Perspective and Recent Developments

The ability to predict circuit performance through simulation is at the core of any design process; it makes the implementation of complex integrated circuits technically feasible and economically viable while relaxing any heavy need for prototyping. Transistor-level circuit simulation is a fundamental computer-aided design technique that enables the design and verification of an extremely broad range of integrated circuits. With the proliferation of modern parallel processor architectures, leveraging parallel computing becomes a necessity and also an important avenue for facilitating large-scale circuit simulation. Parallel Circuit Simulation presents an in-depth discussion on parallel transistor-level circuit simulation algorithms and their implementation strategies on a variety of hardware platforms. While providing a rather complete perspective on historical and recent research developments, it also highlights key challenges and opportunities in developing efficient parallel simulation paradigms.