RISC-V Microprocessor Verification and Design
Harvey Mudd College has become a major developer of the configurable, open CORE-V Wally microprocessor and of the RISC-V Certification test plan and suite. The Clay-Wolkin Fellowship is supported by RISC-V International and Qualcomm in these efforts, and collaborates with companies around the world including Synopsys, Breker, Tenstorrent, and 10x Engineers.
The Clay-Wolkin Fellowship will have openings for Spring 2026. The most common time to join is as a sophomore, especially if taking E154 RISC-V System-on-Chip Design, but juniors and frosh with exceptional backgrounds will also be considered. Prospective fellows will start on a volunteer basis in the spring, and those who find they love the research and are contributing effectively may join the Fellowship.
Areas of interest include:
- RISC-V Certification: development of tests plans, test generators, and automation to certify RISC-V microprocessors. This work will be released open-source by RISC-V International.
- RISC-V Verification: developing tests for new features such as on-chip Debug.
- RISC-V Design: adding new features to CORE-V Wally, including on-chip debug and RVA23 Profile features.
Clay-Wolkin Fellows have been making important contributions to the open-source RISC-V ecosystem and to the RISC-V System-on-Chip Design textbook. You will have opportunities to interact with industry and find careers and graduate study in the field of digital systems.