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Presentation

High-Assurance Software

At the High-Assurance Software Laboratory (HASLab), we improve practice through theory, creating and implementing software that goes beyond mere functionality: we ensure it is correct, resilient, and secure against failures and attacks.


Our team of researchers, scientists, and engineers has proven expertise in software engineering, developing methods and tools to design and integrate robust software; in distributed systems, exploring distribution and replication to ensure scalability and reliability; and in information security, addressing cybersecurity challenges and improving systems with advanced, secure cryptographic protocols, thus minimising vulnerabilities.


With a multidisciplinary approach supported by solid theoretical principles, we develop innovative solutions for critical software, secure cloud infrastructures, and privacy-aware big data management, driving scientific advancement, innovation, and high-level consultancy.


In addition, we complement our core expertise with work in human-computer interaction, programming languages, computational mathematics, and quantum computing - because we believe the future of trustworthy software is built on knowledge and innovation.

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Featured Projects

POISE

Programmable Asynchronous Asymmetric Secure Choreographies

2026-2027

QUANTHOS

QUANTHOS - Fotónica Integrada Topológica Quântica

2026-2027

Rescueware

Cibersegurança e Recuperação de Dados Inteligente e Auto-Configurável para a Resiliência contra Ransomware

2026-2029

HPCTRAIN

EuroHPC traineeships in Hosting Entities, Centres of Excellence and Competence Centres, SMEs and Industry

2026-2029

ADAPQO

Adaptive Query Optimization Architectures to Support Heterogeneous Data Intensive Applications

2025-2026

QuantumCLP

Quantum computing optimization for container loading problems: a new frontier in logistics optimization

2025-2027

BANSKY

A paraconsistent inference engine to support research in age-ralated molecular degeneration

2025-2028

JasminCode

Developing Reliable High-performance Assembly Code using Jasmin

2025-2026

TestBed5G_Robotics

Piloto de Robótica Móvel e Cibersegurança em Ambientes Industriais sobre Comunicações 5G – Europneumaq

2025-2026

ATAI

Aplicação de técnicas avançadas na gestão de escalas

2025-2027

BringTrust

Strengthening CI/CD Pipeline Cybersecurity and Safeguarding the Intellectual Property

2025-2028

SafeIaC

SafeIaC: Reliable Analysis and Automated Repair for Infrastructure as Code

2025-2028

PFAI4_6eD

Programa de Formação Avançada Industria 4 - 6a edição

2025-2025

INSIEME

Integrated Network for data Space and Interoperable Energy Management in Europe

2025-2028

DisaggregatedHPC

Towards energy-efficient, software-managed resource disaggregation in HPC infrastructures

2025-2026

InfraGov

InfraGov: A Public Framework for Reliable and Secure IT Infrastructure

2025-2026

VeriFixer

VeriFixer: Automated Repair for Verification-Aware Programming Languages

2025-2026

JRCSIF

JRC Interoperability Laboratory Adoption of the Semantic Interoperability Framework

2025-2025

CDMS

Claim Denial Management Solution

2025-2026

BolsasFCT_Gestao

Funding FCT PhD Grants - Management

2025-9999

ENSCOMP4

Ensino de Ciência da Computação nas Escolas 4

2024-2026

PeT

PeT - Privacidade e Transparência

2024-2028

PFAI4_5eD

Programa de Formação Avançada Industria 4 - 5a edição

2024-2024

exaSIMPLE

exaSIMPLE: A Hybrid ML-CFD SIMPLE Algorithm for the Exascale Era

2024-2025

EPICURE

High-level specialised application support service in High-Performance Computing (HPC)

2024-2028

BCDSM

BCD.S+M - Modular Blockchain Data Storage and Management System with AI

2024-2027

TwinEU

Digital Twin for Europe

2024-2026

HEDGE_IoT

Holistic Approach towards Empowerment of the DiGitalization of the Energy Ecosystem through adoption of IoT solutions

2024-2027

HANAMI

Hpc AlliaNce for Applications and supercoMputing Innovation: the Europe - Japan collaboration

2024-2027

PFAI4_4eD

Programa de Formação Avançada Industria 4 - 4a edição

2023-2023

QuantELM

QuantELM: from Ultrafast optical processors to Quantum Extreme Learning Machines with integrated optics

2023-2024

ATE

Alliance for Energy Transition

2023-2026

Green_Dat_AI

Energy-efficient AI-ready Data Spaces

2023-2025

EuroCC2

National Competence Centres in the framework of EuroHPC Phase 2

2023-2026

AURORA

Deteção de atividade no interior do veículo

2022-2023

ATTRACT_DIH

Digital Innovation Hub for Artificial Intelligence and High-Performance Computing

2022-2026

NewSpacePortugal

Agenda New Space Portugal

2022-2026

BeFlexible

Boosting engagement to increase flexibility

2022-2026

ENERSHARE

European commoN EneRgy dataSpace framework enabling data sHaring-driven Across- and beyond- eneRgy sErvices

2022-2025

Gridsoft

Parecer sobre a implementação de software para redes elétricas inteligentes

2022-2022

PFAI4_3ed

Programa de Formação Avançada Industria 4 - 3a edição

2022-2022

THEIA

Automated Perception Driving

2022-2023

IBEX

Métodos quantitativos para a programação ciber-física: Uma abordagem precisa para racicionar sobre imprecisões na computação ciber-física

2022-2025

SpecRep

Constraint-based Specification Repair

2022-2023

FLEXCOMM

Towards Energy-aware Communications: Connecting the power grid and communication infrastructure

2022-2023

IDINA

Identidade Digital Inclusiva Não Autoritativa

2021-2025

Sustainable HPC

Computação de elevado desempenho sustentável

2021-2025

CircThread

Building the Digital Thread for Circular Economy Product, Resource & Service Management

2021-2025

PassCert

Exploring the Impact of Formal Verification on the Adoption of Password Security Software

2021-2022

IoT4Distribuicao

Análise de Requisitos e Especificação Funcional de uma Arquitetura Distribuída baseada em soluções IoT para a Gestão e Controlo da Rede de Distribuição

2021-2023

RISC2

A network for supporting the coordination of High-Performance Computing research between Europe and Latin America

2021-2023

DigiLightRail

Solução de Automação do Ciclo de Vida de Projectos de Sinalização Ferroviária

2020-2023

PFAI4.0

Programa de Formação Avançada Industria 4.0

2020-2021

PAStor

Programmable and Adaptable Storage for AI-oriented HPC Ecosystems

2020-2021

ACTPM

Automating Crash-Consistency Testing for Persistent Memory

2020-2021

AIDA

Adaptive, Intelligent and Distributed Assurance Platform

2020-2023

BigHPC

A Management Framework for Consolidated Big Data and HPC

2020-2023

SLSNA

Prestação de Serviços no ambito do projeto SKORR

2020-2021

InterConnect

Interoperable Solutions Connecting Smart Homes, Buildings and Grids

2019-2024

T4CDTKC

Training 4 Cotec, Digital Transformation Knowledge Challenge - Elaboração de Programa de Formação “CONHECER E COMPREENDER O DESAFIO DAS TECNOLOGIAS DE TRANSFORMAÇÃO DIGITAL”

2019-2021

CLOUD4CANDY

Cloud for CANDY

2019-2019

HADES

HArdware-backed trusted and scalable DEcentralized Systems

2018-2022

MaLPIS

Aprendizagem Automática para Deteção de Ataques e Identificação de Perfis Segurança na Internet

2018-2022

SKORR

Advancing the Frontier of Social Media Management Tools

2018-2021

DaVinci

Distributed architectures: variability and interaction for cyber-physical systems

2018-2022

SAFER

Safery verification for robotic software

2018-2021

KLEE

Coalgebraic modeling and analysis for computational synthetic biology

2018-2021

InteGrid

Demonstration of INTElligent grid technologies for renewables INTEgration and INTEractive consumer participation enabling INTEroperable market solutions and INTErconnected stakeholders

2017-2020

Lightkone

Lightweight Computation for Networks at the Edge

2017-2019

CloudDBAppliance

European Cloud In-Memory Database Appliance with Predictable Performance for Critical Applications

2016-2019

Cloud-Setup

PLATAFORMA DE PREPARAÇÃO DE CONTEÚDOS AUDIOVISUAIS PARA INGEST NA CLOUD

2016-2019

GSL

GreenSoftwareLab: Towards an Engineering Discipline for Green Software

2016-2019

CORAL-TOOLS

CORAL – Sustainable Ocean Exploitation: Tools and Sensors

2016-2018

SafeCloud

Secure and Resilient Cloud Architecture

2015-2018

NanoStima-RL1

NanoSTIMA - Macro-to-Nano Human Sensing Technologies

2015-2019

NanoStima-RL3

NanoSTIMA - Health data infrastructure

2015-2019

SMILES

SMILES - Smart, Mobile, Intelligent and Large scale Sensing and analytics

2015-2019

UPGRID

Real proven solutions to enable active demand and distributed generation flexible integration, through a fully controllable LOW Voltage and medium voltage distribution grid

2015-2017

LeanBigData

Ultra-Scalable and Ultra-Efficient Integrated and Visual Big Data Analytics

2014-2017

Practice

Privacy-Preserving Computation in the Cloud

2013-2016

CoherentPaaS

A Coherent and Rich PaaS with a Common Programming Model

2013-2016

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Publications

HASLab Publications

View all Publications

2024

Mastering Artifact Correction in Neuroimaging Analysis: A Retrospective Approach

Authors
Oliveira, A; Cepa, B; Brito, C; Sousa, A;

Publication

Abstract
The correction of artifacts in Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) is increasingly relevant as voluntary and involuntary artifacts can hinder data acquisition. Reverting from corrupted to artifact-free images is a complex task. Deep Learning (DL) models have been employed to preserve data characteristics and to identify and correct those artifacts. We propose MOANA, a novel DL-based solution to correct artifacts in multi-contrast brain MRI scans. MOANA offers two models: the simulation and the correction models. The simulation model introduces perturbations similar to those occurring in an exam while preserving the original image as ground truth; this is required as publicly available datasets rarely have motion-corrupted images. It allows the addition of three types of artifacts with different degrees of severity. The DL-based correction model adds a fourth contrast to state-of-the-art solutions while improving the overall performance of the models. MOANA achieved the highest results in the FLAIR contrast, with a Structural Similarity Index Measure (SSIM) of 0.9803 and a Normalized Mutual Information (NMI) of 0.8030. With this, the MOANA model can correct large volumes of images in less time and adapt to different levels of artifact severity, allowing for better diagnosis.

2024

A Distributed Computing Solution for Privacy-Preserving Genome-Wide Association Studies

Authors
Brito, C; Ferreira, P; Paulo, J;

Publication

Abstract
AbstractBreakthroughs in sequencing technologies led to an exponential growth of genomic data, providing unprecedented biological in-sights and new therapeutic applications. However, analyzing such large amounts of sensitive data raises key concerns regarding data privacy, specifically when the information is outsourced to third-party infrastructures for data storage and processing (e.g., cloud computing). Current solutions for data privacy protection resort to centralized designs or cryptographic primitives that impose considerable computational overheads, limiting their applicability to large-scale genomic analysis.We introduce Gyosa, a secure and privacy-preserving distributed genomic analysis solution. Unlike in previous work, Gyosafollows a distributed processing design that enables handling larger amounts of genomic data in a scalable and efficient fashion. Further, by leveraging trusted execution environments (TEEs), namely Intel SGX, Gyosaallows users to confidentially delegate their GWAS analysis to untrusted third-party infrastructures. To overcome the memory limitations of SGX, we implement a computation partitioning scheme within Gyosa. This scheme reduces the number of operations done inside the TEEs while safeguarding the users’ genomic data privacy. By integrating this security scheme inGlow, Gyosaprovides a secure and distributed environment that facilitates diverse GWAS studies. The experimental evaluation validates the applicability and scalability of Gyosa, reinforcing its ability to provide enhanced security guarantees. Further, the results show that, by distributing GWASes computations, one can achieve a practical and usable privacy-preserving solution.

2024

Berry: A code for the differentiation of Bloch wavefunctions from DFT calculations

Authors
Reascos, L; Carneiro, F; Pereira, A; Castro, NF; Ribeiro, RM;

Publication
COMPUTER PHYSICS COMMUNICATIONS

Abstract
Density functional calculation of electronic structures of materials is one of the most used techniques in theoretical solid state physics. These calculations retrieve single electron wavefunctions and their eigenenergies. The berry suite of programs amplifies the usefulness of DFT by ordering the eigenstates in analytic bands, allowing the differentiation of the wavefunctions in reciprocal space. It can then calculate Berry connections and curvatures and the second harmonic generation conductivity. The berry software is implemented for two dimensional materials and was tested in hBN and InSe. In the near future, more properties and functionalities are expected to be added.Program summary Program Title: berry CPC Library link to program files: https://doi .org /10 .17632 /mpbbksz2t7 .1 Developer's repository link: https://github .com /ricardoribeiro -2020 /berry Licensing provisions: MIT Programming language: Python3 Nature of problem: Differentiation of Bloch wavefunctions in reciprocal space, numerically obtained from a DFT software, applied to two dimensional materials. This enables the numeric calculation of material's properties such as Berry geometries and Second Harmonic conductivity. Solution method: Extracts Kohn-Sham functions from a DFT calculation, orders them by analytic bands using graph and AI methods and calculates the gradient of the wavefunctions along an electronic band. Additional comments including restrictions and unusual features: Applies only to two dimensional materials, and only imports Kohn-Sham functions from Quantum Espresso package.

2023

Toward a Practical and Timely Diagnosis of Application's I/O Behavior

Authors
Esteves, T; Macedo, R; Oliveira, R; Paulo, J;

Publication
IEEE ACCESS

Abstract
We present DIO, a generic tool for observing inefficient and erroneous I/O interactions between applications and in-kernel storage backends that lead to performance, dependability, and correctness issues. DIO eases the analysis and enables near real-time visualization of complex I/O patterns for data-intensive applications generating millions of storage requests. This is achieved by non-intrusively intercepting system calls, enriching collected data with relevant context, and providing timely analysis and visualization for traced events. We demonstrate its usefulness by analyzing four production-level applications. Results show that DIO enables diagnosing inefficient I/O patterns that lead to poor application performance, unexpected and redundant I/O calls caused by high-level libraries, resource contention in multithreaded I/O that leads to high tail latency, and erroneous file accesses that cause data loss. Moreover, through a detailed evaluation, we show that, when comparing DIO's inline diagnosis pipeline with a similar state-of-the-art solution, our system captures up to 28x more events while keeping tracing performance overhead between 14% and 51%.

2023

LOOM: A Closed-Box Disaggregated Database System

Authors
Coelho, F; Alonso, AN; Ferreira, L; Pereira, J; Oliveira, R;

Publication
PROCEEDINGS OF12TH LATIN-AMERICAN SYMPOSIUM ON DEPENDABLE AND SECURE COMPUTING, LADC 2023

Abstract
Cloud native database systems provide highly available and scalable services as part of cloud platforms by transparently replicating and partitioning data across automatically managed resources. Some systems, such as Google Spanner, are designed and implemented from scratch. Others, such as Amazon Aurora, derive from traditional database systems for better compatibility but disaggregate storage to cloud services. Unfortunately, because they follow an open-box approach and fork the original code base, they are difficult to implement and maintain. We address this problem with Loom, a replicated and partitioned database system built on top of PostgreSQL that delegates durable storage to a distributed log native to the cloud. Unlike previous disaggregation proposals, Loom is a closed-box approach that uses the original server through existing interfaces to simplify implementation and improve robustness and maintainability. Experimental evaluation achieves 6x higher throughput and 5x lower response time than standard replication and competes with the state of the art in cloud and HPC hardware.