Radiobiology Services

Our Focus

Radiobiology Services provides information on the effects of ionizing and non-ionizing radiation on living systems, including identification of radiation hazards in the aviation environment and methods of protection from such hazards.

The CARI computer programs are software developed for use on personal computers by researchers at the FAA's Civil Aerospace Medical Institute (CARI is an older acronym for the institute), with help from many other scientists across the country and worldwide. The primary purpose of the programs is to calculate doses of galactic cosmic radiation received by individuals on aircraft flights.

Our CARI-6 based calculator is temporarily unavailable.

CARI software may be downloaded for personal use. The CARI-7 and CARI-7A programs are the most recent and can take into account changes in altitude, solar activity, geomagnetic storms, and geographic location during the course of a flight, using flight information entered by the user. CARI-7 is intended as a direct replacement for CARI-6 and CARI-6M, which do not include geomagnetic storm corrections. CARI-7A includes more run-time physics model options that could be of interest to researchers and academic users (different dose outputs, SPE spectra, etc.). CARI-7 and -7A are available precompiled for 64-bit Windows or Linux. Users needing the source code or more options should contact us. CARI-6 calculates effective dose and assumes the shortest route (a geodesic) between any two airports in the world. CARI-6M also calculates effective dose but uses waypoint defined flight routes rather than assuming a geodesic route. Both CARI-6 and -6M require a 16-bit DOS compatible environment.

Last updated: Friday, September 5, 2025