This month during the Paris Air Show, Airbus extended its partnership with a Japanese industrial consortium for research and development into structural health monitoring (SHM) for aircraft composites with a five-year follow-on programme, called JASTAC-II (Japan Airbus SHM Technology for Aircraft Composite).

Structural health monitoring includes the non-destructive testing of defects, damages stress and condition on board the aircraft, and this latest agreement sets the framework for implementing technologies developed during the project's initial phase, JASTAC.

Airbus' Head of Research & Technology Chief Engineer Michel Comes signed the contract with Professor Nobuo Takeda, of Japan's Material Process Technology Center (SOKEIZAI Center) – which encompasses the partnerships with Japan's Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI), Kawasaki Heavy Industries, Fuji Heavy Industries (FHI), as well as the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), which will join this consortium as part of the latest agreement. 
As the newest phase of this program, JASTAC-II will seek to deploy the benefits of optical fibre-based structural health monitoring technologies from MHI, Kawasaki Heavy Industries and FHI in real applications for improved: aircraft operability, carbon fibre reinforced plastic structural design, and quality control during manufacturing and assembly. 
JASTAC is a cooperative research and development project between Airbus and Japanese industry, which started as a five-year agreement during the 2006 Farnborough International Airshow and was extended an additional two years in 2011.