Improving the implementation of high-level languages

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My past, current, and future research contributes to improve the implementation of high-level programming languages, and that of functional languages in particular. Programming has slowly been moving towards higher-level languages, that is, towards simpler, more expressive, more powerful, more intuitive languages. Programming languages are work tools, and choosing a powerful tool for challenging projects leads to many benefits. Development and testing times are reduced. In addition to reductions in times, the resulting software has a tendency to be more reliable. Consequently, choosing a high-level language is not simply a question of taste or style, but it is also an economically sensible choice. I am also interested in improving the implementation of other languages too, not exclusively that of high-level ones, and, more generally, I am interested in making software more reliable. Means of achieving those goals include encouraging the use of high-level languages, of course, but also developing and improving direct reliability- and security-enhancing techniques---like programming with contracts and static and dynamic formal software verification---or, in other words, focussing on the parts of software engineering that are based on programming language technologies.