Optimizing the V&V process for critical systems

In the design of critical systems and software, validation and verification (V&V) that requirements are met is a crucial activity. Since budgets are limited, it is not possible to perform all of the possible V&V activities; a subset must be chosen that maximizes the chances of mission success by reducing risk while meeting budget constraints. By explicitly modeling the contributions that various V&V activities make to reducing risks, and the costs of these activities, we are able to convert this to a classical optimization problem. We then use search, clustering and visualization algorithms to examine the large space of options.