The GUARDS project addresses the development of architectures, methods, techniques, and tools to support the design, implementation and validation of critical real-time systems. The innovative approach of the project towards this strategic objective lies on the elaboration and exploitation of a coherent methodology integrating five fundamental features:

• Genericity, to support reusability of hardware and software components and architectures in multiple applications and domains, in particular in space, nuclear and railway fields;
• Dependability, to support the design and implementation of fault tolerance mechanisms complying with safety and availability requirements;
• Real-time predictability, to support the fulfilment of the stringent real-time constraints imposed by the considered applications;
• Ability to be validated, to support the definition of instances of the generic architecture that comply with the requirements imposed by each of the targeted applications;
• Ability to be certified, to meet the certification obligations imposed by various standardisation authorities.