About Me

My name is Mel Tsai (email address is _tsa_imelv_@yahoo.com, remove the underscores). I received my BSEE at Michigan State University in 1999, MSEE from Berkeley in 2003, and Ph.D. from Berkeley in August 2005. I was born and raised in Michigan and went to Okemos High School.

I was a graduate student at U.C. Berkeley for 6 years. As a graduate student, my research interests included programming models for network applications, modular and extensible router architectures, network processor benchmarks, storage networks, computer architecture, security/encryption, DSP architectures, and embedded systems. My master's thesis involved the development of a comprehensive benchmarking methodology for commercial network processors. My dissertation work is called RouterVM, a practical, high-level configuration interface for next-generation routers and appliances. My advisor was professor Randy Katz.

I am currently a Technical Leader within Cisco's Desktop Switching Business Unit (DSBU), working on a variety of hardware and software projects. Before starting work at Cisco, for five years I was employed at Berkeley Design Technology, Inc. (BDTI). Founded in 1991, BDTI specializes in the evaluation and analysis of digital signal processors (DSPs) and general-purpose embedded processors. My principle job functions involved the evaluation of DSP architectures and various hardware analysis projects. As part of my work, I am the primary author or coauthor of several of BDTI's published reports; see my publications section.

That's it!