In various examples, searching of data—including real-world data, simulation data, system under test (SUT) data, and/or map data—may be executed using a query engine configured to compile detailed binary code from high-level declarative queries for searching the data to identify scenarios or engineering artifacts of interest. A user may identify a behavior or scenario of interest, define the behavior or scenario in a descriptive and/or declarative manner—including implicit indications of temporal or spatial relationships—and the query engine may then compile an explicit procedural description that may be used to search the data for one or more instances and/or variations of the defined scenario or computational representation of an engineering artifact under investigation. Once the scenarios are identified, behaviors of the machine may be observed, criteria with respect to the machine performance may be evaluated, and/or test coverage with respect to the scenario type may be collected.