The mission of the National Center for Advanced Secure Systems Research (NCASSR) at the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign is to conduct basic and applied research leading to development of next generation information security technologies that address national cybersecurity needs and requirements. Led by the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA), NCASSR's cutting-edge cybersecurity research team capitalizes on the high performance computational experience and resources at NCSA and the University of Illinois, leveraging those strengths in cooperation with complementary research groups at other institutions. Supported through funding from the Office of Naval Research (ONR), the NCASSR security research agenda is developed with ONR to focus in areas of current and future information assurance that address Navy/Department of Defense capability requirements.

Background and Purpose
In 2002, the University of Illinois established NCASSR as a basic and applied research initiative to address current and next generation critical cybersecurity and infrastructure needs and research requirements. The Center defines an evolving set of broad research thrust areas, developing new approaches and technologies with the ultimate goal of application, implementation and integration of these research initiatives to existing/planned government and/or DoD systems. Research work focuses on "high risk, high return" efforts to define and prototype scalable, dynamic and self-healing approaches to cybersecurity.

NCASSR Management
Leadership and overall management for the NCASSR program are provided by the National Center for Supercomputing Applications at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Current active or primary Center partners include researchers from Battelle Pacific Northwest Division, Naval Postgraduate School and the Naval Research Laboratory Center for Computational Science. The NCASSR Executive Advisory Committee is tasked to ensure development efforts meet current and emerging Navy/DoD/Government IA needs and requirements.

Funding
The FY 2003 appropriation to the DoD provided $5.75 million for NCASSR through the Department of Navy, and the FY 2004 appropriation added $7.5 million for NCASSR (under RDT&E, PE No. 060223N, Common Picture Applied Research). The FY 2005 appropriation to the DoD provided $5 million for NCASSR, and in FY 2006, the appropriation was $2.67 million. NCSA continues to work aggressively with ONR to develop/evolve research initiatives for continuing multi-year Center funding, which commenced in May 2003.