Theses Proposals

This page reports (as much as I can) about current vacant theses assignments which can be carried out with me. For additional information, come to office hours or send an email to the instructor.

Message To Prospective Students

My research program is very software-intensive, focusing largely in the area of parallel and distributing computing, performance evaluation, modeling and computer simulation, computer architectures, operating systems. If you wish to work with me on a Master’s Thesis, please consider the following checklist before:

  • I am not scared to write in C, and I have a strong desire to work with software very intensely.
  • I have been exposed to some low-level assembly language programming like x86 or ARM, MIPS or other, and it has been an interesting expecience.
  • I have been using UNICES (Linux, FreeBSD or other variants) happily for a while.
  • I have been exposed to parallel programming ( pthreads, MPI, OpenMP).
  • I have fun with algorithms.
  • I’m not scared by mathematical and logical modeling.

If you recognize yourself (even partially) in the above profile, or if you would like to increase your skills in some of the above points, please send me an email!

I look forward to hearing from you!

Theses Topics at a glance

High Performance Simulation

Theses in the field of High Performance Simulation tackles topics related to the design and development of distributed and highly-parallel runtime environments to support the execution of generic simulation models according to a speculative processing paradigm. Some theses target the definition and implementation of simulation models relying on this paradigm.

To get more information on this thesis topic, you can read the following papers: 1 2 3 4 5 6.

Spiking Neural Networks

Spiking neural networks (SNN) are among the most computationally intensive types of simulation models, with node counts on the order of up to $10^{11}$. This thesis topic tackles the implementation of efficient runtime environments for SNN simulation on parallel and distributed architectures. See this supporting material for an additional framing of the topic: 1, 2. Also, we are currently exploring the behaviour of these networks, when compared to more traditional timestepped execution models.

High-Performance Data Processing

We are building a high-performance software infrastructure to support (distributed) data processing of massively-parallel simulations. Theses in this topic deal with distributed systems, high-performance computing, autonomic optimization, heterogeneous computing. Also, we are interested in programmability of these systems, to identify effective ways to deploy stream processing pipelines to (distributed) heterogeneous systems.

Energy Efficiency

Theses in this field tackle with the problem of identifying a suitable trade-off between performance and energy consumption. The body of work in this area targets methodologies and techniques to allow for an automatic identification of the power/energy/performance level which maximizes the overall efficiency of the application.

To get more information on this thesis topic, you can read the following papers: 1 2 3 4.

Additional topics regard the identification of the optimal placement of computation in complex heterogeneous systems, to identify optimal configurations that can improve performance while saving on energy.

Non-Blocking Algorithms

Non-blocking algorithms are a family of concurrent algorithms which enforce correctness by relying on fine-grain synchronization hardware instructions, globally termed Read-Modify-Write instructions. Theses in this family address the implementation of data structures which support a massive number of concurrent operations by relying on this form of fine-grain synchronization.

To get more information on this thesis topic, you can read the following papers: 1 2

Heterogeneous Architectures

Heterogeneous architectures are computer architectures in which there are several different families of processing units (CPUs, GPUs, Coprocessors, low-energy cores, etc.) which can be exploited simultaneously. In this context, we are studying how to make different hardware classes interact to reach a common (synchronized) processing goal.

Cybersecurity

In the context of cybersercurity, we are mostly dealing with defensive security. The main topics are related to Intellectual Property Preservation, by means of code obfuscation based on virtualization and self-modifying binaries. The approach we tackle is profoundly based on low-level manipulation of code and data, driven by high level tools proper of Theoretical Computer Science.

Theses Archive

Below, you can find a list of Bachelor’s (a selection), Master’s, and PhD thesis which I have been involved in supervising, or which belong to my research group. They could serve as an indication of the kind of work which is carried out by my research group.

2023

[PhD Thesis] A. Piccione, “On Techniques to Handle Risk in Speculative Pallel Discrete-Event Simulation,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2023. [PDF] [Bibtex]
Supervisor: A. Pellegrini
[MSc Thesis] D. Dell’Orco, “Unmasking Android Malware: A Comprehensive Study of Evasion Techniques and Detection Strategies,” University of Rome “Tor Vergata,” 2023. [Bibtex]
Supervisor: A. Pellegrini
[MSc Thesis] M. Ciccaglione, “Metamorphic transformations: Safeguarding software IP with Generative Grammars,” University of Rome “Tor Vergata,” 2023. [Bibtex]
Supervisor: A. Pellegrini
[MSc Thesis] M. Ciccaglione, “Metamorphic transformations: Safeguarding software IP with Generative Grammars,” University of Rome “Tor Vergata,” 2023. [Bibtex]
Supervisor: A. Pellegrini
[MSc Thesis] A. Pepe, “Engine Metamorfico per la Protezione della Proprietà Intellettuale,” University of Rome “Tor Vergata,” 2023. [Bibtex]
Supervisor: A. Pellegrini
[MSc Thesis] P. Caliandro, “Protezione della proprietà intellettuale mediante offuscamento basato su virtualizzazione,” University of Rome “Tor Vergata,” 2023. [PDF] [Bibtex]
Supervisor: A. Pellegrini
[MSc Thesis] S. Tiberi, “Meccanismo d’autorizzazione per accedere ad oggetti critici del kernel basato sul percorso d’esecuzione,” University of Rome “Tor Vergata,” 2023. [PDF] [Bibtex]
Supervisors: F. Quaglia, A. Pellegrini

2022

[PhD Thesis] M. Principe, “New methods for the effectiveness of speculative parallel discrete event simulation,” University of Rome “Tor Vergata,” 2022. [PDF] [Bibtex]
Supervisor: F. Quaglia - Co-Supervisor: A. Pellegrini
[PhD Thesis] S. Carnà, “Methodologies and techniques for on-line exploitation of Performance Monitor Units in modern computing systems,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2022. [PDF] [Bibtex]
Supervisor: F. Quaglia - Co-Supervisor: A. Pellegrini

2021

[MSc Thesis] A. Izzillo, “Graph and Flow-based Distributed Detection and Mitigation of Botnet Attacks,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2021. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: A. Pellegrini.
[PhD Thesis] E. Silvestri, “Micro-Threading: Effective Management of Tasks in Parallel Applications,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2021. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: F. Quaglia.

2020

[PhD Thesis] R. Marotta, “Innovative Algorithms for Shared Data Structures in Multi-core Platforms,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2020. [Bibtex]
Supervisor: F. Quaglia - Co-Supervisor: A. Pellegrini
[PhD Thesis] S. Economo, “Techniques and tools for program tracing and analysis with applications to parallel programming,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2020. [PDF] [Bibtex]
Supervisor: F. Quaglia - Co-Supervisor: A. Pellegrini
[MSc Thesis] A. Pimpini, “High Performance Simulation of Spiking Neural Networks,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2020. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: A. Pellegrini.
[MSc Thesis] L. Altamura, “Asymmetric Runtime Environments for Increased-Performance Speculative PDES,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2020. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: A. Pellegrini. Co-Supervisor: S. Conoci
[MSc Thesis] U. Mazziotta, “Parallel Priorities: Optimizing Priority Queues for NUMA Machines,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2020. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: A. Pellegrini - Co-Supervisor: R. Marotta

2019

[PhD Thesis] D. Cingolani, “A new approach to reversible computing with applications to speculative parallel simulation,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2019. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: F. Quaglia - Co-Supervisor: A. Pellegrini
[PhD Thesis] M. Ianni, “Share-everything Parallel Discrete Event Simulation on Multi-core Machines,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2019. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: F. Quaglia - Co-Supervisor: A. Pellegrini
[MSc Thesis] S. Ferracci, “Detecting Cache-based Side Channel Attacks using Hardware Performance Counters,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2019. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: A. Pellegrini - Co-Supervisor: S. Carnà
[MSc Thesis] A. Piccione, “An Agent-Based Simulation API for Speculative PDES Runtime Environments,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2019. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: A. Pellegrini

2018

[MSc Thesis] S. Carnà, “HOP - Hardware-based Online Profiling of multi-threaded applications via AMD Instruction-Based Sampling,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2018. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: F. Quaglia - Co-Supervisor: S. Economo
[MSc Thesis] M. Principe, “Transparent Distributed Cross-State Synchronization in Optimistic Parallel Discrete Event Simulation,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2018. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: F. Quaglia - Co-Supervisor: A. Pellegrini

2017

[MSc Thesis] E. Silvestri, “Fine-Grain Time-Shared Execution of In-Memory Transactions,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2017. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: F. Quaglia - Co-Supervisors: S. Economo, A. Pellegrini, P. Di Sanzo
[MSc Thesis] S. Conoci, “Efficient Software Transactional Memory via Thread Scheduling and Dynamic Voltage and Frequency Scaling,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2017. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: F. Quaglia - Co-Supervisor: P. Di Sanzo
[MSc Thesis] S. Rivieccio, “Energy Efficient Spin-Locking in Multi-Core Machines,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2017. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: F. Quaglia - Co-Supervisor: P. Di Sanzo
[MSc Thesis] A. Scarselli, “A Lock-Free Buddy System for Scalable Memory Allocation,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2017. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: B. Ciciani - Co-Supervisor: F. Quaglia, M. Ianni, R. Marota
[MSc Thesis] T. Tocci, “ORCHESTRA: An Asynchronous Wait-Free Distributed GVT Algorithm,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2017. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: B. Ciciani - Co-Supervisor: A. Pellegrini

2016

[MSc Thesis] R. Marotta, “A Lock-Free O(1) Priority Queue for Pending Event Set Management,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2016. [PDF] [Bibtex]
Supervisor: F. Quaglia - Co-Supervisors: P. Di Sanzo, A. Pellegrini
[MSc Thesis] N. Marziale, “Dynamic Clustering of Simulation Objects in Speculative Parallel Simulation Systems,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2016. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: F. Quaglia - Co-Supervisor: A. Pellegrini
[MSc Thesis] F. Nobilia, “Runtime Management of Simulation Objects Cross-State Dependencies in NUMA-oriented Parallel Simulation Platforms,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2016. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: F. Quaglia - Co-Supervisor: A. Pellegrini

2015

[MSc Thesis] M. Ianni, “Transactional Memory Based Speculative Parallel Execution of Discrete Event Applications,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2015. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: F. Quaglia - Co-Supervisor: A. Pellegrini
[MSc Thesis] S. Economo, “Lightweight approximate virtual page access tracing of multi-threaded applications via static binary instrumentation,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2015. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: F. Quaglia - Co-Supervisor: A. Pellegrini
[MSc Thesis] A. La Rizza, “Elastic cloud resources provisioning for life insurance undertaking applications,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2015. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: B. Ciciani - Co-Supervisors: A. Pellegrini
[MSc Thesis] L. Forte, “Proactive Workload Management in Cloud Environments in the Presence of Software Aging,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2015. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: B. Ciciani - Co-Supervisors: P. Di Sanzo, A. Pellegrini
[BSc Thesis] A. Scarselli, “Gestione ottimizzata della delivery e del buffering dei messaggi in piattaforme multi-thread in architetture NUMA,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2015. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: F. Quaglia - Co-Supervisor: A. Pellegrini

2014

[PhD Thesis] A. Pellegrini, “Techniques for Transparent Parallelization of Discrete Event Simulation Models,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2014. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: F. Quaglia
[PhD Thesis] S. Peluso, “Efficient Protocols for Replicated Transactional Systems,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2014. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisors: F. Quaglia, P. Romano
[PhD Thesis] D. Rughetti, “Autonomic Concurrency Regulation in Software Transactional Memories,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2014. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: B. Ciciani
[MSc Thesis] D. Cingolani, “Application Transparent and Efficient Mixed State-Saving in Speculative Simulation Platforms,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2014. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: F. Quaglia - Co-Supervisor: A. Pellegrini

2013

[PhD Thesis] R. Vitali, “Design of Software Support Structures for High Performance Optimistic Simulations with Special Focus on Multi-Core Hosting Environment,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2013. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: F. Quaglia

2012

[PhD Thesis] P. Di Sanzo, “Performance Models of Concurrency Control Protocols for Transaction Processing Systems,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2012. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: B. Ciciani
[PhD Thesis] R. Palmieri, “Speculative Protocols for Actively Replicated Transactional Systems,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2012. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: F. Quaglia
[MSc Thesis] P. Stroia, “Securing the IDT and the System Call Table from malicious LKMs,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2012. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: F. Quaglia - Co-Supervisor: A. Pellegrini

2011

[MSc Thesis] A. Porfirio, “Progettazione e implementazione di un meccanismo di rollback parziale per memorie software transazionali,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2011. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: F. Quaglia - Co-Supervisors: P. Di Sanzo, A. Pellegrini
[MSc Thesis] G. Cerasuolo, “Cache-Aware Memory Manager for Optimistic Simulations,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2011. [Bibtex]
Supervisor: F. Quaglia - Co-Supervisors: A. Pellegrini, R. Vitali
[BSc Thesis] F. Visca, “Tecniche di instrumentazione statica per il supporto alla trasparenza verso il programmatore nelle STM,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2011. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: F. Quaglia - Co-Supervisors: A. Pellegrini, R. Palmieri

2010

[MSc Thesis] A. Pellegrini, “Salvataggio e Ripristino Autonomico dello Stato degli Oggetti nei Sistemi di Simulazione Ottimistici,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2010. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: F. Quaglia
[MSc Thesis] S. Peluso, “missing record,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2010. [Bibtex]
Supervisor: F. Quaglia
[MSc Thesis] D. Didona, “missing record,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2010. [Bibtex]
Supervisor: F. Quaglia

2008

[MSc Thesis] R. Vitali, “missing record,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2008. [Bibtex]
Supervisor: F. Quaglia
[MSc Thesis] D. Rughetti, “Raccolta ed elaborazione di dati provenienti da reti di sensori distribuiti,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2008. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: B. Ciciani - Co-Supervisor: P. Romano
[MSc Thesis] R. Palmieri, “Modellazione e valutazione di DBMS relazionali basati su lock e pattern di accesso non uniformi,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2008. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: B. Ciciani
[BSc Thesis] A. Pellegrini, “Tracciamento trasparente ed efficiente di scritture su memoria dinamica con granularità arbitraria in architetture per il calcolo ottimistico,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2008. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: F. Quaglia

2007

[PhD Thesis] P. Romano, “Protocols for End-To-End Reliability in Multi-Tier Systems,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2007. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: F. Quaglia

2006

[BSc Thesis] R. Palmieri, “MicroOpGen tool and developing extensions for DisSimulator, a simulator for PD32 educational-processor,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2006. [Bibtex]
Supervisor: B. Ciciani

2003

[PhD Thesis] A. Santoro, “Semi-Asynchronous Checkpointing for Optimistic Parallel Simulation,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 2003. [Bibtex]
Supervisor: B. Ciciani

1999

[PhD Thesis] F. Quaglia, “Consistent Checkpointing in Distributed Computations: Theoretical Results and Protocols,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 1999. [PDF] [Bibtex] [Abstract]
Supervisor: B. Ciciani
[PhD Thesis] M. Romero, “Disparity/Motion Estimation for Stereoscopic Video Processing,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 1999. [Bibtex]
Supervisor: B. Ciciani

1998

[PhD Thesis] G. Battaglini, “Analysis of Manufacturing Yields Evaluation of VLSI/WSI Systems: Methods and Methodologies,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 1998. [Bibtex]
Supervisor: B. Ciciani

1995

[MSc Thesis] F. Quaglia, “Passo ottimo del salvataggio dello stato nel tool SIMCOR,” Sapienza, University of Rome, 1995. [Bibtex]
Supervisor: B. Ciciani