Prof. Dr. rer. nat. Angelika Brückner-Foit Fachgebiet Qualität und Zuverlässigkeit, Institut für Werkstofftechnik, Kassel Research is focused on establishing relations between process and performance under mechanical/thermal loading and is hence closely related to the aspect of reliability along the process chain. The knowledge gathered will open up new paths for performance based optimizing of components subjected to mechanical and/or thermal loading. The vision is to establish control loops processing parameters --> microstructure --> -damage mechanisms --> lifetime --> processing parameters as an integral part of the processing routine. The scientific challenge lies in understanding the interrelations between the different steps. While there is quite a good understanding of the relations between processing parameters and microstructure in many cases, most models for the damage accumulation process are either purely descriptive or not based on experimental observation. A widespread damage mechanism is crack initiation and growth of micro-cracks. Whereas there is a good understanding of the crack growth phase and its interaction with the microstructure, the mechanisms to crack initiation are less clear.. The propensity of a specific micro-structural unit to acting as a crack initiation site depends both on the properties of the unit and on the surrounding microstructure. Moreover, local variations of the micro-deformation field may enhance or suppress crack initiation. Here, both the spatial arrangement of phases and their mechanical properties play an important role. Both quantities depend strongly on the details of the processing routine. Consequently, the complete control loop has to be taken into account, if the crack initiation process is critical for performance-based optimization and lifetime analysis. » Back to Who is Who