I’m a PhD student in Software Engineering based in Buenos Aires, Argentina. I work on the development of a tool called «Mimicry Monitors» with applications in regression testing and fuzzing, bridging software engineering theory with concrete tools and industry collaboration.
I’m particularly interested in computation theory, logic, automata, and formal verification, both from their mathematical foundations and in their practical application to reliable software development.
Participated in a DApp Development Hackathon sponsored by Pyth and Cardano.
Participated at the 11th and 12th Argentine Workshop on Fundamentals for the Automatic Analysis and Construction of Software
Won First Price on a Smart Contract Development Hackathon with my teammates.
Gave a presentation for the ICC Day on my graduate Thesis. I also displayed a poster.
I work at the Institute for Research in Computer Science (ICC), which is a joint institute of the University of Buenos Aires (UBA) and the National Scientific and Technical Research Council (CONICET) operating within the Department of Computer Science at the Faculty of Exact and Natural Sciences (FCEN) of the University of Buenos Aires. It is located at the Zero+Infinity building, which is pictured left to this section.
My work focuses on the implementation and application of a novel tool called Mimicry Monitors.
What are Mimicry Monitors?
They are a program verification technique that leverages shared code between program versions to reduce the computational cost of analysis. Given two programs that share a common fragment, a Mimicry Monitor is constructed to simulate the behavior of one program using the other as a reference, exploiting structural similarities to avoid redundant verification work. This approach integrates naturally into regression testing and fuzzing pipelines, where programs evolve incrementally and re-analyzing unchanged code from scratch represents a significant overhead. The result is a more scalable verification workflow that preserves formal guarantees while reducing the resources required to achieve them.
What do you do with them?
I implemented the full construction and instrumentation pipeline for Mimicry Monitors. The tool automates everything from static analysis and automaton construction to program instrumentation. I also tested it on GNU Core Utilities for regression testing scenarios, and I'm currently exploring its application to differential fuzzing.
Reach out with collaboration ideas, speaking requests, or inquiries about my research.
E-mail: felicitasgarcia01@gmail.com
University E-Mail: fgarcia@dc.uba.ar
A brief section to recommend articles and interesting reads
AI boosting Formal Verification Martin Kleppman´s blog
Vericoding (As opposed to Vibecoding) Bursuc et al. A benchmark for vericoding: formally verified program synthesis. 2025