Corina Pasareanu

Corina Pasareanu is an ACM Fellow and IEEE ASE Fellow serving as a Principal Scientist at Carnegie Mellon University's CyLab Security and Privacy Institute and Technical Professional Leader for Data Science at NASA Ames Research Center through KBR. Her work bridges formal methods, software verification, and artificial intelligence to ensure the safety and security of complex systems, particularly autonomous systems and machine learning applications.

Dr. Pasareanu received her academic training at:

• Ph.D. in Computer Science, Kansas State University (2001)
• M.S. in Computer Science, University Politehcnica of Bucharest (1995)
• B.S. in Computer Science, University Politehcnica of Bucharest (1994)

Her research focuses on developing formal verification techniques that can provide mathematical guarantees about the behavior of complex software systems. She specializes in applying model checking, symbolic execution, and compositional verification methods to challenges in autonomy, security, and AI safety. Her recent work addresses the verification of systems incorporating machine learning components, particularly neural networks used in safety-critical applications like autonomous vehicles. She investigates how to ensure these systems behave correctly even when their perception components have uncertainties or are subject to adversarial attacks.

Analysis of her recent publications shows a strong trend toward verifying AI and machine learning systems, particularly focusing on neural networks in autonomous systems. Her work increasingly addresses the challenges of Large Language Models, examining both their vulnerabilities to attacks and methods to defend against them. She also continues to advance traditional software verification techniques while adapting them to modern programming languages and paradigms.

Dr. Pasareanu has received numerous prestigious awards recognizing her contributions to the field:

• ACM Fellow
• IEEE ASE Fellow
• ETAPS Test of Time Award (2021)
• ASE Most Influential Paper Award (2018)
• ESEC/FSE Test of Time Award (2018)
• ISSTA Retrospective Impact Paper Award (2018)
• ACM Impact Paper Award (2010)
• ICSE 2010 Most Influential Paper Award (2010)

As an advisor, Dr. Pasareanu mentors several PhD students and postdoctoral researchers, often in collaboration with other faculty members at CMU. Her students focus on cutting-edge research at the intersection of formal methods and AI safety. Her research is supported by substantial funding from diverse sources including NSF, DARPA, NASA, AWS, and industry partnerships. She leads multiple projects focused on AI security, formal verification of neural networks, and software analysis techniques. Dr. Pasareanu also plays a significant role in the broader research community, serving as Program/General Chair for major conferences including ICSE 2025, and as an associate editor for IEEE TSE and STTT.

Dr. Pasareanu leads research teams working on projects like "Trinity: Neurosymbolic Learning and Reasoning" (DARPA) and "HUGS: Human-Guided Software Testing and Analysis" (NSF). Her work often involves interdisciplinary collaboration between computer scientists, formal methods experts, and domain specialists to address complex safety challenges in autonomous systems.