Researchers in the Life Prediction Branch at the NASA Glenn Research Center have conceived and developed the CARES integrated design software series, a general-purpose design tool that provides an innovative, cost-effective approach to systematically optimize the design of brittle material components using probabilistic reliability analysis techniques. Utilization of this software is essential to optimize component design and manufacture based on reliability, and consequently achieve the best use of high-value-added ceramic and other brittle material systems in critical structural components subjected to tensile thermomechanical stresses.

This software combines multidisciplinary research - in the areas of fracture analysis, probabilistic modeling, model validation, and brittle structure design - with extensive computational capabilities into one comprehensive package to perform accurate computer simulation prior to costly component fabrication. Input for this software includes material data from simple experiments and stress and temperature distributions obtained from finite element analysis (FEA) of complex components. The CARES software is coupled to several commercially available FEA programs, resulting in an integrated design tool for government, industry, and academia which is adapted to the user's local computing environment.