Koushik received his BS (Research) degree from Indian Institute of Science (IISc) Bangalore in 2021. After completing his undergraduate studies, he pursued an MS at IISc, during which he spent a year working on theoretical models of the effects of disorder in spin-liquid states in Heisenberg spin systems. He is currently pursuing a PhD in Sayeef Salahuddin’s group at University of California, Berkeley. He works on developing foundry-ready new materials for energy-efficient logic and memory devices. Through this work, he has developed expertise in thin-film deposition, device fabrication, electrical characterization, structural characterization using synchrotron X-rays, nonlinear optical spectroscopy, and electron microscopy techniques.
Research
The rapid increase in computing demand and energy consumption has pushed the need for energy efficiency in electronics which is essential for the advancement of all next-generation computing technologies. Achieving these advances, however, requires simultaneous innovation in materials, transport physics, and device engineering.
My research focuses on leveraging atomic-scale engineering to uncover and harness previously unexplored functionalities in scalable, foundry-compatible material systems, and integrating them with state-of-the-art device technologies for the advancement of computing chips. My work aims to address key challenges in low-power computing through several efforts, including: 1. The development of ultra-low-power ferroelectric films designed for integration into next-generation industrial nonvolatile memory platforms. 2. The engineering of heterostructures for low-power, high-frequency logic applications. 3. The discovery of emerging physical phenomena in industry-compatible materials with potential impact across future computing technologies.