Companies building aircraft bodies and computer casings can now test their composite materials designs to destruction without breaking a thing.

They can use a software "toolbox" developed by Conor McCarthy and Ted Vaughan at the University of Limerick's Materials and Surface Science Institute. The "Composite MicroMechanics (Comm) Toolbox" has been licensed to 12 countries, including the US and China.

Composite development involves mixing a variety of ingredients to produce special characteristics, for example using carbon fibres to deliver lightweight but tough aircraft wings. Composites used to be the preserve of aircraft, sports car and yacht designers but composites are finding their way into everyday products.

They developed the Comm Toolbox to provide designers with the tools needed to understand how composite materials behave in harsh environments in the virtual world, says Dr McCarthy. This allows the user to predict how a component will perform without actually having to make it, something that saves time and money.