Jonathan Balkind

Jonathan Balkind is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Computer Science at the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB). His research focuses on the intersection of computer architecture, programming languages, and operating systems, with an emphasis on pragmatic system design and open-source hardware. He leads the ArchLab at UCSB and is affiliated with the OpenPiton project, an open-source manycore research framework.

Education includes a PhD and MA in Computer Science from Princeton University (adviser: Prof. David Wentzlaff), an MSci in Computing Science from the University of Glasgow (advisers: Prof. Joseph Sventek and Dr. John O'Donnell), and exchange studies at UCSB. His work has been supported by awards such as the NSF Early CAREER Award (2023) and the Open Hardware Trailblazer Fellowship (2022).

Research interests span heterogeneous computing, cache-coherent systems, FPGA integration, and domain-specific architectures. Notable projects include the 25-core Piton chip, the CIFER SoC with embedded FPGA, and the DECADES manycore processor. Recent publications address fused-kernel operating systems (Stramash), control logic synthesis, and hyperloop data-center architectures.

His awards reflect contributions to open-source hardware and academic mentorship, including Siebel Scholarship (2018), Gordon Y.S. Wu Fellowship (2013–2017), and multiple teaching/research recognitions. He actively collaborates with industry (e.g., Microsoft Research, ARM) and advises on open-source projects.