Building Resource Adaptive Software Systems (BRASS) | Apply Online

Opportunity Summary:

Building Resource Adaptive Software Systems (BRASS) is a DARPA Information Innovation Office research solicitation focused on making complex software last longer, fail less often, and keep working even as its operating environment changes. The core problem BRASS is trying to solve is that many important software systems are built with assumptions about the resources they will have available (compute, memory, energy, network bandwidth, storage, peripherals, operating system services, libraries, hardware features, and even logical resources like APIs and middleware). Over time, those assumptions break: platforms get upgraded, dependencies change, sensors and networks come and go, workloads shift, and constraints like power or latency tighten. BRASS seeks foundational advances so software can adapt to those changes rather than becoming brittle, expensive to maintain, or operationally unusable.

Technically, the opportunity calls for innovative proposals spanning formal methods, program analysis, compiler design, and runtime/virtual machine implementation. The emphasis is on creating tools, techniques, and system building blocks that enable "resource-adaptive" behavior, meaning software can detect when its resource situation has changed and respond in a controlled, predictable way. This may involve automatically selecting alternative implementations, restructuring computations, adjusting fidelity or performance targets, swapping components, or otherwise reconfiguring execution to remain correct and useful under new constraints. A major theme is survivability and longevity: instead of software needing frequent manual rewrites and retesting whenever the environment shifts, BRASS aims for approaches that preserve intended behavior and safety properties while still allowing the system to scale up, scale down, or reshape itself as resources fluctuate.

The program description highlights "long lived, survivable, and scalable adaptive software systems" and suggests that achieving this requires advances across the full stack. Formal methods and program analysis are relevant because adaptation cannot be ad hoc if the software is mission-critical; it needs rigorous ways to specify what must remain true (correctness, safety, security, real-time constraints) and then prove or check that adaptive transformations and runtime choices preserve those guarantees. Compiler techniques matter because compilers can generate multiple resource-aware variants, insert instrumentation, or restructure code to make adaptation possible without hand-editing every application. Runtime and virtual machine work matters because many resource changes are only visible during execution, and the runtime is where monitoring, policy enforcement, dynamic optimization, and safe reconfiguration can be coordinated.

From an administrative standpoint, this is a discretionary research and development opportunity (CFDA 12.910, Research and Technology Development) issued as DARPA BAA 15-36 under the Information Innovation Office. DARPA indicates multiple potential funding instruments, including cooperative agreements and contracts, and states there is no cost-sharing or matching requirement. Eligibility is listed as unrestricted, meaning any type of entity may apply, subject to any limitations spelled out in the full announcement. The solicitation was posted April 7, 2015, with proposals due May 22, 2015 at 12:00 noon EDT, and it was archived June 21, 2015.

In practical terms, BRASS is an attempt to move beyond one-off "porting" and constant maintenance toward software that can endure platform evolution and operational turbulence. The solicitation encourages research that produces concrete tooling and infrastructure enabling developers and operators to build systems that can keep functioning as their resource landscape shifts, while still maintaining high confidence that the system remains correct and dependable. The point of contact listed for access issues is Dr. Suresh Jagannathan, DARPA I2O Program Manager and BAA Coordinator, with the additional information link pointing to the full DARPA BAA 15-36 announcement on FedBizOpps.

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