PhD Candidate in AI-Assisted Reverse Engineering of Integrated Circuits

The Cognitive Science & Artificial Intelligence Research Center at Tilburg University is seeking a PhD candidate for the Secure Hardware Intelligence Extraction and Logic Deconstruction (SHIELD) project. This research focuses on automating the reverse engineering of integrated circuits to support hardware assurance, threat analysis, and intelligence gathering. You will work at the intersection of computer vision, micro-electronic analysis, and hardware security, collaborating with the Netherlands Defence Academy and the Netherlands Forensic Institute. The role involves developing deep learning pipelines for chip analysis and graph-based inference models to identify potential hardware vulnerabilities. You will be based in the Department of Intelligent Systems, contributing to open-access research and technical documentation.

• Develop deep-learning pipelines for segmenting chip layers and classifying transistors from high-resolution microscopic images.
• Create graph-based inference models to reconstruct high-level logic blocks and identify anomalous structures.
• Evaluate methods for memory content extraction and vulnerability analysis based on physical chip layout data.
• Automate manual reverse engineering processes using AI to interpret chip structures despite noise and obfuscation.
• Validate developed methodologies using real-world forensic datasets provided by project partners.
• Contribute to open-access scientific publications and technical documentation regarding hardware security.
• Collaborate with external stakeholders from the defense and forensic sectors to ensure practical research relevance.