Simha's research interests are in hardware security and energy-efficient computing. He is the principal investigator on the DARPA SPARCHS project at Columbia University. The goal of the project is to discover how systems should be designed if security was a first order design requirement in addition to the traditional requirements like power/performance etc. He has been recognized with an Alfred P Sloan Fellowship (2013), NSF CAREER award (2011), two IEEE Micro "top pick" awards (2004, 2013) and a graduate teaching award (2006). He obtained his PhD from UT Austin in 2007.