Engineering Project

Sohum Sohoni

*** **, ******** ***** **********, Stillwater, Oklahoma 74078

405-***-**** ***********@*****.***

Objective: Teach undergraduate and graduate courses in computer engineering; Mentor graduate students and

young faculty members in research and teaching; Help shape department and college strategies and vision,

participate in large-scale curriculum reform efforts; Train faculty members in methods of effective teaching.

Education

2004 PhD in Computer Engineering, University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, Ohio

1998 B. E. in Electrical Engineering, Government College of Engineering Pune (COEP), India

Work Experience

2005-present, Assistant Professor, Oklahoma State University, Stillwater

Selected Research Activities and Projects:

Established a research program in computer architecture as director of the CAESAR lab: 9 (4 current, 5 past)

graduate and 9 (3 current and 6 past) undergraduate researchers on projects in computer architecture and

engineering education.

CpE Progressive Learning Platform: CO-PIs YoonJung Cho, Kerri Kearney, and Rebecca Damron. The

project focuses on the design and development of software, hardware, customizable lab assignments and

tutorials for a single platform that will be useful for all computer engineering lab courses. This will allow

students to see the interconnections between various courses that they take, and the concepts that they

learn in these courses. The project is funded by NSF- grant EEC-1136934, PI Sohum Sohoni, August

2011-July 2013.

Cooperative Games for Learning Engineering Systems Design: CO-PI Rebecca Damron. This project

aims to create a highly interactive, multiplayer game that serves as a vehicle for teaching system d esign

skills in electrical and computer engineering.

FACE: Feedback about Cyber-classroom Engagement: CO-PIs Damon Chandler, Kerri Kearney. The

project aims to design and test facial analysis and synthesis technology to enhance distance education.

There are two goals; one is to provide distance students with facial expressions of the instructor so they

can get the full impact of the instructor s message. The other is to analyze facial expressions of distance

students to provide feedback to the instructor.

TA Training: CO-PIs YoonJung Cho and Donald French. The project aims to gauge the impact that lab

TAs have on student learning and to find ways to train TAs to maximize the positive impact they would

have on student learning. A novel needs assessment based approach will allow for customization of

training modules for TAs from specific institutions or departments.

Out of Context Prefetching for L2 Caches: An innovative approach to mitigating the effects of the

CPU-memory gap. The prefetching unit works with the OS scheduler to identify processes with low

memory bandwidth requirements, and initiates prefetching for high-bandwidth processes during the time

slice of a low-bandwidth process. The project was funded by NSF- grant CNS-0720741, PI Sohum

Sohoni, July 2007- June 2010.

Reducing the Overhead of Memory Integrity Verification: This project explored the design space and

solutions for reducing the overhead of memory integrity verification, and possible co-design of hardware

and a secure operating system. The project was funded by the Bureau of Justice Assistance (funded

through OSU CTANS), PI Sohum Sohoni, August 2009- July 2010.

Teaching Activities

Redesigned the core computer engineering courses ECEN 3213 and ECEN 4243 to follow a student-

oriented developmental model, while simultaneously enhancing the content coverage in each course.

Introduced active learning and problem-based learning in these courses.

Redesigned the computer architecture sequence (ECEN 4243, 5253, 6253) to provide wider and deeper

coverage for the undergraduate course, and a more research oriented focus on the graduate courses.

Designed an Engineering Science course ENSC 3213 as an introductory computer science course for all

engineering disciplines.

Designed an introductory graduate-level Compiler Optimizations course to provide students breadth in

their knowledge of computer engineering.

Service and Outreach Activities

Public relations committee for ECE. Work includes developing strategy for recruiting graduate and

undergraduate students, setting up tours for prospective students, and developing recruitment and

marketing literature for the department.

ABET and undergraduate curriculum committee. Work includes ABET report writing, keeping track of

reporting requirements, assessing curriculum improvement data, and suggesting ways to further improve

the ECE program.

ECE Graduate Programs Committee. Various issues regarding graduate admission and graduation

procedures, rules and regulations are tackled. Currently, the committee has been tasked with re-writing the

graduate memorandum and preparing an assessment plan for the graduate program.

ECE Design Day Committee. Preparation, planning, implementation of ECE Design Day, and assessment

of course projects. Design Day is a celebration of the design activities of ECE students at all levels, and a

recruitment event for ECE.

Collaborations with institutions in India. Visited CIT and COEP in India, and strengthened existing ties

while establishing new ones at these institutions.

Previous Employment:

Intel Corporation, Microprocessor Research Labs (MRL), Santa Clara

May 2001-Sept. 2001: Research Intern

Analyzed the performance of the SHORE database manager running a decision support workload, TPC-

H. Specifically, performed the following tasks:

Ported the SHORE-based database to the Windows 2000 environment.

Studied how TPC-H was implemented using SHORE and fixed some anomalies in the code.

Performed measurement based studies of system performance/system execution time.

University of Cincinnati

Sept 2000-Sept 2004: Research Assistant

Core member of the Operating Systems and Computer Architecture Research lab. Wrote grant proposals,

managed and mentored junior lab members. Successfully completed a number of research projects

outlined below.

April 1999-Sept 2000: Mathematics Tutor

Taught students the fundamentals of mathematics and helped them shed their fear of math. Tutored

students in the entire spectrum of courses offered, from Basic Algebra to Advanced Calculus.

Past Projects as Graduate Student:

Prefetching for L2 caches:

Designed a low power, high performance L2 cache for general purpose processors with low-

bandwidth/low-overhead prefetching, and a modified LRU replacement policy.

Designed, implemented and tested a compact and efficient detector that monitors accesses to the

L2. This low overhead detector forms the basis of the new cache design.

Enhanced the DineroIV cache simulator, SimpleScalar out-of-order event-driven simulator, and

the Simics full-system simulator to obtain detailed and extensive simulation results.

Databases on PCs:

Implemented the TPC-H benchmark (using C++) on the SHORE database manager.

Collected results for memory system performance using the VTune performance analyzer.

DEFERCacheSim:

Designed and developed a distributed I/O cache simulator for a network of workstations.

Designed, implemented and tested new algorithms for improving the write performance of

cooperative caching using duplication and logging.

Multimedia Cache Performance:

Investigated the memory requirement (L1 caches and TLB) of various multimedia applications

using trace driven simulations and compared it to SPEC95/2000 benchmarks.

Generated required traces using ATOM to instrument the program binaries.

Obtained simulation results through the DineroIII cache simulator and validated them using

actual measurements on a Pentium III processor using Rabbit PMC and P6Perf.

Peer Reviewed Publications:

1. S. Sohoni, D. French, Y. Cho, Need Assessment for Graduate Teaching Assistant Training: A

Survey to Capture Particular Needs at an Institution, accepted for publication, ASEE National

Annual Conference and Expo (ERM Division), 2011.

2. D. Fritz, W. Mulia, S. Sohoni, B. Gordon, K. Kearney, M. Mwavita, The Progressive Learning

Platform for Computer Engineering accepted for publication, ASEE National Annual Conference

and Expo (ECE Division), 2011.

3. N. Sehgal, S. Sohoni, Y. Xiong, D. Fritz, W. Mulia, J. Acken, A Cross Section of the Issues and

Research Activities Related to Both Information Security and Cloud Computing, IETE Technical

Review, accepted for publication.

4. J. Marpaung, L. Johnson, S. Sohoni, S. Lakkakula, Music Synthesizer for Digital Logic Design

Course, 8th IEEE International Conference on Microelectronic Systems Education.

5. D. Fritz, W. Mulia, S. Sohoni, The Progressive Learning Platform ; Workshop on Computer

Architecture Education, San Antonio, TX, February 2011.

6. B. Gordon, S. Sohoni, D. Chandler, Data Handling Inefficiencies between CUDA, 3D

Rendering, and System Memory, Proc. IEEE International Symposium on Workload

Characterization, Atlanta, GA, December 2010.

7. Y. Xiong, S. Sohoni, Memory Integrity Verification Speedup using Separated L2 Hash Cache,"

Proc. of Theoretical and Applied Computer Science (TACS), Stillwater, OK, November, 2010.

8. P. Pathak, S. Sohoni Markov Prediction Scheme for Cache Prefetching," Proc. of Theoretical

and Applied Computer Science (TACS), Stillwater, OK, November 2010.

9. Y. Cho, S. Sohoni, D. French, Need Assessment for Graduate Teaching Assistant Training:

Identifying Important But Under-Prepared Roles, presented at ASEE Midwest Section Annual

Conf., Lawrence, KS, September 2010. Won 2nd place Outstanding Paper Award.

10. D. Fritz, A. Millian, S. Sohoni, Torrents of Streams ; presented at International Conference on

Embedded Systems, July 2010, Coimbatore, India

11. D. Fritz, W. Mulia, S. Sohoni, "Quantifying the Cache Filtering Effect for Multimedia

Applications in Embedded Systems," Proc. of Theoretical and Applied Computer Science

(TACS), Stillwater, OK, October, 2009.

12. J. E. Stine, J. Chen, I. Castellanos, G. Sundararajan, M. Qayam, P. Kumar, J. Remington, S.

Sohoni, FreePDK v2.0: Transitioning VLSI Education Towards Nanometer Variation-Aware

Designs, Proc. IEEE International Conference on Microelectronic Systems Education, San

Francisco, CA, July 2009.

13. S. Sohoni, C. D. Shaver, J. M. Acken, D. Mertz, L. E. Nelson, J. Remingt on, B. Sadr, G.

Sundararajan, Evaluation Criteria for Biometric Based Identity Authentication Systems,

presented at International Conference on Sensors, Security, Software and Intelligent Systems,

Coimbatore, India, January 2009

14. D. Fritz, W. Mulia, S. Sohoni, Exploring Out of Context Cache Prefetching, presented at

International Conference on Sensors, Security, Software and Intelligent Systems, Coimbatore,

India, January 2009

15. V. Janepally, S. Sohoni, Fast Encryption and Authentication for Cache-to-Cache Transfers using

GCM-AES, presented at International Conference on Sensors, Security, Software and Intelligent

Systems, Coimbatore, India, January 2009

16. D. Fritz, W. Mulia, S. Sohoni, Out of Context Cache Prefetching presented at ACM

Architectural Support for Programming languages (ASPLOS), poster session, Seattle, WA,

March 2008.

17. J. Pitts, P. Teague, S. Sohoni, Effects of the Team-Based Approach on Individual Learning,

presented at ASEE Annual Conference, ECE Division, Honolulu, Hawaii, 2007.

18. S. Sohoni, M. Reiten, March 7th 2017: The Day the Microprocessor Died ; National Center for

Case Study Teaching in Science, 2007.

19. S. Sohoni, Improving L2 Cache Performance through Stream-Directed Optimizations ; Ph.D.

Dissertation, Dept. Electrical and Computer Engineering and Computer Science, University of

Cincinnati, Cincinnati, OH, September 2004.

20. Z. Xu, S. Sohoni, R. Min and Y. Hu, An Analysis of Memory System Performance of

Multimedia Applications, IEEE Trans. on Computers, vol. 53, no. 1, pp. 20-38, Jan. 2004.

21. S. Narasimhan, S. Sohoni and Y. Hu, A Log Based Write-Back Mechanism for Cooperative

Caching, Proc. 17th IEEE International Parallel and Distributed Processing Symposium (IPDPS

2003), Nice, France, April 22-26, 2003, p. 61b.

22. S. Sohoni, R. Min, Z. Xu and Y. Hu, A Study of Memory System Performance of Multimedia

Applications, Proc. ACM SIGMETRICS 2001/PERFORMANCE 2001, Cambridge,

Massachusetts, June 2001, pages 206-215.

Awards and Honors:

Regents Distinguished Teaching Award, 2010

ASEE Midwest Section, 2nd Place Outstanding Paper Award

President s Office & Campus Life Leadership Recognition Program, Certificate of Excellence as

Faculty advisor for the Indian Student Association, 2010

CEAT Halliburton Excellent Young Teacher Award, 2009

President s Office & Campus Life Leadership Recognition Program, Certificate of Excellence as

Faculty advisor for the Indian Student Association, 2009

Grants and Scholarships:

Grant proposal, Progressive Learning Platform for Computer Engineering, funded by the

National Science Foundation through the Research Initiation Grants in Engineering Education

(RIGEE) program July 2011, $150,000.

Grant proposal, Reducing the Overhead of Memory Integrity Verification, funded by Bureau of

Justice Assistance through OSU CTANS, August 2009, $27,500.

Grant proposal, Out of Context Prefetching for L2 Caches, funded by the National Science

Foundation through the Computer Systems Research (CSR) program July 2007, $200,000.

o REU supplement for the grant was awarded ($6,000) for summer 2008.

o REU supplement for the grant was awarded ($16,000) for summer 2009.

Grant proposal, Characterizing the Cache Performance of Decision Support Workloads on

Workstation Architectures selected by the University Research Council for the URC Graduate

Student Summer Fellowship 2003, University of Cincinnati.

Grant proposal, An Analysis of the Memory Referencing Behavior of Multimedia Applications

selected by the University Research Council for the URC Graduate Student Summer Fellowship

2002, University of Cincinnati.

Research Assistantship in the Operating Systems and Computer Architecture Research

Laboratory, UC (June 2000-June 2004).

University Graduate Scholarship, University of Cincinnati. (Sept. 1998- Sept. 2003).

Invited Talks:

OS Interaction with Cache Memories, Conference on Theoretical and Applied Computer

Science, Stillwater, November 2010

Teaching in American Classrooms as International Faculty Members: Insights, Per spectives, and

Strategies, Institute for Teaching and Learning Excellence, Stillwater, October 2010

General Purpose Embedded Processing in Many-Core Systems, Keynote Address, International

Conference on Embedded Systems, Coimbatore, India, July 2010

Faculty Who Have Survived at Various Points on Continuum, Panel Discussion, Institute for

Teaching and Learning Excellence, Stillwater, September 2008

Different Perspectives: Diversity and its Impacts, Diversity and Leadership Inclusion,

Stillwater, November 2006

Professional Development Activities:

Preparing Online Instructors, 2010

Provost s Early Career Faculty Development Workshop Series, 2009

Provost s Faculty Development Initiative: Focus on General Education Learning Goals, 2009

National Effective Teaching Institute, Hawaii, June 2007

National Case Studies in Science Workshop, Buffalo, May 2006

Institute for Teaching and Learning Excellence active participant, 2006-current.

Recent Collaborators:

Chuck Bunting, Damon Chandler, Alan Cheville, Louis Johnson, James Stine; Electrical

Engineering, Oklahoma State University

YoonJung Cho, Kerri Kearney, Mwarumba Mwavita, College of Education, Oklahoma State

University

Donald P. French, College of Arts and Science, Oklahoma State University

Karen High, Chemical Engineering, Oklahoma State University

Naresh Sehgal, Intel Corporation

Current Students:

Graduate: David Fritz (PhD), Ying Xiong (PhD), Wira Mulia (PhD), Patrick Teague (M.S.),

Pranav Pathak (M.S.).

Undergraduate: William Flanery, Andrew Millian, Joshua Holland

Past Graduate Students:

David Fritz (M.S.), currently pursuing PhD at OSU and part-time at Sandia National Labs

Kazunori Nishimura (M.S.), first employment with Cameron Measurement, Duncan, OK

Varun Jannepally (M.S.), employed in Intel Corp. Mexico

Wira Mulia (M.S.), currently pursuing PhD at OSU

Brian Gordon (M.S.), first employment with B&W Pantex, Amarillo, TX

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