| Submission deadline | May 2, 2014 |
| Notification | May 18, 2014 |
| Camera ready | June 1, 2014 |
| Early registration deadline | June 8, 2014 |
We invite researchers attending CAV 2014, and others, to participate in this workshop focused on verification of molecular devices and programs. This workshop will include a mix of invited and contributed talks. Paper submissions are encouraged from researchers and students wishing to give an oral presentation. Selected contributions will be invited to a special journal issue. The main goal of this workshop is to expose verification researchers to the interesting problems, and unique challenges, found in the domain of engineered biological systems. We have therefore invited a number of leading theoretical and experimental researchers, active in the molecular programming community, to give keynote talks and have also planned a tutorial on the verification of DNA strand displacement systems.
It is our belief that verification, within the broader setting of computer aided design tools, needs to take on a larger role in these areas. Furthermore, verification researchers have the potential to make significant contributions and help grow these fields in new directions. We welcome you to join the conversation.
Correctly implementing traditional software or hardware is already a difficult and error-prone task. Consider the additional challenges when implementing a molecular device, such as a DNA based computer, composed of billions or trillions of nucleic acid strands. At once, the strands form the hardware of the system and their potential interactions comprise the software. In any particular configuration of strands, or state of the system, any potential binding of complementary domains leads to a new state. Programmers only have control over the design of the strands. Can they be certain strands interact in only desirable ways? Other engineered biological systems have their own unique challenges. Since an end goal of these systems is to run within living cells, safety and correctness are of paramount concern. Yet, wet lab experimentation is both time consuming and expensive and the scale of these systems prohibits direct observation. There is therefore great potential for the application of formal methods and automated verification in the rational design of these systems, in order to ensure that they are safe and robust.
Email the organizers for any comments or questions.
