AEROSPACE

The Cornell Theory Center’s Computational Materials Institute (CMI) is a lead academic institution in a project that has been awarded $14.1 million of a potential $32 million, if all the options are exercised, from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). The contract will be used to develop and demonstrate a physics-based approach to predict the state of structural health of individual Department of Defense (DoD) vehicles. The Structural Integrity Prognosis System (SIPS) will discover and track the precursors of structural failure and provide predictions of vehicle structural health under a variety of future usage options. The research has the potential to significantly improve the operational readiness of critical assets of the American military forces, such as the EA-6B, reduce operational costs by avoiding unnecessary retirements of equipment, and transform the DoD structural certification process. “Existing methodologies for assurance of vehicle structural integrity do not permit optimal use of available assets, which impacts combat system availability and readiness,” said Tony Ingraffea, the Dwight C. Baum Professor of Civil Engineering at Cornell and Cornell Theory Center (CTC) Associate Director. “This is primarily due to a conservative ‘safe life’ and ‘damage tolerance’ philosophy that results in the grounding or flight restriction of aircraft and can result in a significant reduction of the total potential life of the fleet.” To ensure accuracy on a vehicle-by-vehicle basis, the approach will rely on evaluation of the microstructural characteristics of the materials in question and on the use of these characteristics to predict damage evolution through modeling and simulation. Researchers will develop a system capable of following each critical static and dynamic vehicle structural component from its fabrication to retirement. The prognosis system will be founded on collaboration among sensor systems, advanced reasoning methods for data fusion and signal interpretation, and modeling and simulation systems. High-fidelity modeling will be founded on experimental characterization of the pertinent microstructures, and model predictions will be verified with focused experiments. The research team includes prime contractor Northrop Grumman, ALCOA, Cornell University, Mississippi State University, Carnegie Mellon, Georgia Institute of Technology, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Lehigh University, the University of Pennsylvania, and several small businesses. The multi-year project is scheduled to be completed in two phases by September 30, 2007, and will use state-of the-art computational, laboratory, and manufacturing facilities for research, development, fabrication, and testing, including one of the high-performance computing clusters of the CTC: a Windows-based 128-dual processor machine ranked as one of the 100 fastest supercomputers in the world. “Receiving a DARPA contract underscores the importance of this project,” said Ingraffea. “When implemented, the results of this collaboration have the potential to strengthen the ability of our armed forces to carry out their responsibilities safely and in a fiscally responsible manner.” “Northrop Grumman has had nearly 20 years of rewarding interaction with Prof. Ingraffea’s group at Cornell,” said Dr. Harry Armen, Director of Technology Development at Northrop Grumman. “The CMI will provide critical modeling and simulation capability to this project. -The results of their combined efforts have the potential to significantly improve the accuracy and reliability of the tools military planners and field commanders use to assess the readiness level of their equipment. In addition, the results from this program can significantly lower the “cost of ownership” of high-value military assets by reducing operational, maintenance and inspection costs. DARPA is the central research and development organization for the DoD. It manages and directs selected basic and applied research and development projects for DoD, and pursues research and technology where risk and payoff are both very high and where success may provide dramatic advances for traditional military roles and missions. CMI serves as the locus for several research initiatives in materials science and engineering that involve faculty and staff at Cornell University. These programs are multi-scale collaborations across disciplines and institutions. The projects have a range of common interests that bring them to CTC. These include increasing demands for high-performance computing resources, development of integrated toolkits, and research in advanced, efficient algorithms. CTC is a high-performance computing and interdisciplinary research center located on the Ithaca campus of Cornell University with additional offices in Manhattan. CTC currently operates an Intel/Windows cluster complex consisting of more than 1500 processors, in addition to Unisys ES7000 Servers. Scientific and engineering projects supported by CTC represent a vast variety of disciplines, including bioinformatics, behavioral and social sciences, computer science, engineering, finance, geosciences, mathematics, physical sciences, and business.