This $599,888 federal Project Grant was awarded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) under the Computer and Information Science and Engineering (CISE) program (CFDA 47.070). The grant supports research at Duke University to develop innovations that accelerate symbolic execution, a type of program execution that maintains a description of variable values rather than their actual values.
The research aims to enable new applications for symbolic execution in computer security, debugging, and diagnostics. Key innovations being explored include methods to reduce program instrumentation, quickly find control-flow paths, limit explored paths, and otherwise reduce symbolic execution costs. One application is a technique to verify that messages received from a remote component are consistent with the claimed or sanctioned component software, as a defense against malicious inputs. The grant will fund this three-year research project from August 2024 to July 2027, with the goal of releasing improved symbolic execution software and involving students from underrepresented groups.
Generated 3/4/25, 8:40 AM