These research summaries give a snapshot of many of the research efforts within the Ptolemy Project. These summaries appear in Chapter 2 "Computer-Aided Design", Chapter 10 "Communications and Signal Processing", and Chapter 21 "Parallel Architectures, Languages, and Applications" of the EECS/ERL 1996 Research Summary book. The research summary is published once a year by the Industrial Liaison Program, Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences Department, and the Electronics Research Laboratory of the University of California at Berkeley, California. The Industrial Liaison Program office can be reached at +1-510-643-6691 or ilp@eecs.berkeley.edu