During Ph.D.:
CSAW Logic Locking Competition 2021 Sep 2021 - Nov 2021
Advisor: Prof. Jeyavijayan Rajendran (Assistant Professor at SETH Lab of ECE, TAMU)
Content: How to use query access only to predict the funcitoinality of a Boolean circuit, where the search space is exponential in the circuit's input size. We put forward and impliment a heuristic approach to predict the circuit accurately and efficiently on all competition designs.
• Led a 2-member team to break the provided circuits.
• Proposed and implimented the algorithm to predict the circuit's functionality while achieving good accuracy and efficiency.
• Obtained the 1st place out of all teams around the world.
Sparse Prime Implicant (SPI) attack on CAC-rem technique April 2019 - Jan 2021
Advisor: Prof. Jeyavijayan Rajendran (Assistant Professor at SETH Lab of ECE, TAMU)
Content: Logic locking is a countermeasure that can defeat different threats in hardware security. In logic locking, CAC-rem is the only unbreakable technique based on a point-function encrypted structure. In this project, we put forward the SPI attack that is the first attack to break CAC-rem.
• Investigated CAC-rem and obtained background of logic locking, emphasizing SFLL.
• Design and implement the algorithm of the SPI attack.
• Tested the SPI attack's performance launching on CAC-rem locked circuit with different scale.
CSAW Logic Locking Competition 2019 Sep 2019 - Jan 2020
Advisor: Prof. Jeyavijayan Rajendran (Assistant Professor at SETH Lab of ECE, TAMU)
Content: SFLL-fault is one logic locking technique that can defend against all algorithmic attacks. There are three challenging combinational protected circuits given NYU CSAW locked by both RLL and SFLL-fault. Our goal is to recover the challenging circuits back to their correct functions.
• Led a 3-member team to break the provided circuits.
• Put forward a methodology to extract functional stripped circuit (FSC) for circuits protected by one-point function logic locking.
• Implement an algorithm that tries to detect protected input pattern (PIP).
• Recovered the locked circuits given by CSAW to their correct function.
Multi-Objective Strategies for SFLL Dec 2018 - Nov 2019
Advisor: Prof. Jeyavijayan Rajendran (Assistant Professor at SETH Lab of ECE, TAMU)
Content: SFLL is the latest and hitherto unbroken logic-locking techniques in logic locking. However, the poor trade-off between security and corruption rate is always a weakness for SFLL. This project is to increase the corruption rate by choosing the internal nodes of the combination circuit. There are three metrics put forward to achieve a better trade-off between security and corruption rate.
• Investigated and obtained background of logic locking, emphasizing SFLL.
• Designed and optimized three algorithms to increase outputs corruption rate.
• Tested on circuits with proposed algorithms and analyzed their feasibilities.
During Undergrad:
Nitrate concentration test based on chemical sensors Jul 2017 - Aug 2017
Advisor: Prof. Giacinta Parish (Associate Dean (Research) at Microelectronics Research Group of EECE, UWA)
Content: Using chemical sensors can monitor the nitrate concentration in polluted rivers or lakes. When facing different nitrate concentrations, the chemical sensor will show different situations that can reflect in voltage.
• Grasped the procedural logistics of semiconductor experiments.
• Investigated new type of functionalization (molecular ion receptors) for AlGaN/GaN transistor-based chemical sensors.
• Tested the feasibility of the new membrane (molecular ion receptors) on AlGaN/GaN devices.
• Detected specific ions through testing the response to nitrate concentration in solution.
Information transmission and re-read using acousto-optic effect Sep 2016 - Mar 2017
Advisor: Prof. Xiaoping Tao (Associate Professor at Physics Experiment Center, USTC)
Content: The system transformed the acoustic signal into the optical signal that can be transformed back to the acoustic signal with another transformed system.
• Designed and built the optical path, developed the transformed systems.
• Designed and optimized the circuits that processed the electrical signal.
• Realized saving and applying to re-read information with a microcontroller.
• Collected and analyzed the data to prove the feasibility of the applications.
Quadruped robot design May 2016 - Oct 2016
Advisor: Lec. Changxing Shao (Lecturer at Department of Automation in School of Information and Technology, USTC)
Content: The quadruped robot achieves robot walks and some other functions like avoiding obstacles and visual identification, controlled by a microcontroller.
• Led a 5-member team to design, construct, and debug on the quadruped robot.
• Designed and assembled the whole structure.
• Designed and optimized circuits involved in robots action.
• Optimized the movements of the robot through a microcontroller.
Magnetic train design Oct 2015 - Dec 2015
Content: Using a solenoid coil with a columnar battery inside and two-button magnets at both ends to achieves the solenoid coil running on the given pathway.
• Led a 4-member team to construct the magnetic train.
• Designed the magnetic train and the pathway.
• Researched and calculated the motion status in an electromagnetic way
Hearing light Nov 2014 - June 2015
Advisor: Prof. Yunfeng Huang (Associate Professor and Researcher at CAS Key Laboratory of Quantum Information, USTC)
Content: When there is light shining on a transparent bottle with coal ash, a sound can be generated by the changing variable-frequency light.
• Put forward the causes of the physical phenomena.
• Designed and established optical path.
• Verified by analyzing the waveform of the sound and speculated the principle of the effect.