Shahin Tajik

Shahin Tajik is an Assistant Professor at the Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering at Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI), with affiliations in Cybersecurity. He joined WPI in July 2020 after serving as an Assistant Research Professor at the Florida Institute for Cybersecurity Research (FICS) at the University of Florida. He holds a Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from the Technical University of Berlin (2017), an M.S. from the same institution (2013), and a B.S. from K. N. Toosi University of Technology (2010).

His research focuses on hardware security, including non-invasive/semi-invasive side-channel analysis, Physically Unclonable Functions (PUFs), FPGA security, and anti-tamper mechanisms. Notable contributions include his ACM CCS’17 paper on optical contactless probing of FPGA bitstream encryption, which won the 2017 CSAW Applied Research Competition. He is also the recipient of the NSF CAREER Award for his work on power delivery network-aware hardware security.

Dr. Tajik has served as a reviewer for IEEE and ACM journals and as a technical program committee member for conferences like CHES, HOST, and FDTC. His recent research explores tamper detection via impedance sensing, laser fault injection defenses, and secure edge computing through the Northeastern Microelectronics Coalition (NEMC), where he leads the Secure Edge Computing tech area.

• Education:
  • Ph.D., Electrical Engineering, Technical University of Berlin (2017)
  • M.S., Electrical Engineering, Technical University of Berlin (2013)
  • B.S., Electrical Engineering, K. N. Toosi University of Technology (2010)

His work bridges theoretical advancements with practical defenses, emphasizing hardware's physical layer vulnerabilities. Recent trends in his publications address challenges like chiplet verification, impedance-based tamper detection, and leveraging AI for forensic analysis of electronic components.

• Awards:
  • NSF CAREER Award (2024)
  • 1st Place, CSAW Applied Research Competition (2017)

His grants include funding for laser-assisted attack monitoring (2022) and NSF support for student travel to hardware security events (2024). He collaborates on initiatives like CHIPS Act’s Microelectronics Commons program through NEMC, advancing secure edge computing infrastructure.

Labs/Teams: Technical co-lead for Secure Edge Computing at NEMC, involved in interdisciplinary projects addressing hardware security across academia and industry.