You can contribute articles with the following main topics:

• History of functional safety
• Explanation of functional safety
• Basis of functional safety
• Functional safety management
• Life-cycle concepts
• Documentation
• Verification, validation, assessment, audits
• Modifications
• Measures to avoid and control failures
• Hazard and risk analysis
• Planning
• Hardware design
• Software design
• Installation and commissioning
• Validation
• Operation
• Maintenance and repair
• Modification and retrofit
• Decommissioning or disposal

Practical case studies will have our preference and will have priority with publishing. The following is just an overview of the typical practical topics that you can address. The list is certainly not complete and the author is invited to introduce other topics.

Typically contributions that address practical issues could be:

• An example of a safety plan for an end user, a system integrator or product developer
• An example of a verification and/or validation plan
• An example of a risk calibration process
• An example of a hazard and risk analysis study (HAZOP, FTA, LOPA, etc)
• An example of a safety requirements specification on end-user level
• An example of a safety requirements specification on system integrator level
• An example of a safety requirements specification on product supplier level
• An example of a hardware architectural design
• An example of a software specification
• An example of a reliability study (Markov, FTA, FMEDA, etc.)
• An example of safety analysis techniques (DFM, Petri nets)
• An example of test plan
• An example of a worked out life-cycle model
• An example maintenance procedure
• An example of a modification procedure
• An example of a checklist
• Etc.

Case studies could focus on the following industries:

• Oil & gas plants
• Chemical plants
• Machinery applications
• Pharmaceutical applications
• Aerospace examples
• Energy plants (nuclear, gas, coal, etc.)
• Automotive
• Medical
• Etc

Case studies could focus on the following products, systems, applications:

• Sensors (temp, pressure, gas, flow, etc.)
• Barriers
• Logic solvers
• Relays
• Valve positioners
• Solenoid valves
• Shutdown valves
• Partial stroke testing equipment
• Burner management applications
• Turbine applications
• Fire and gas applications
• Sprinkler systems
• Halon systems
• Alarm management systems
• Programming environments
• Bus communication
• Etc.

Contributions on laws, standards, and certification level could address:

• Overview of safety laws (SEVESO, ATEX, Machinery, Low Voltage, EMC, etc.)
• Overview standards other than 61508, 61511, 62061 (e.g., EN 50402, ISO 13849-1, etc)
• Relationship between laws and standards
• Example of the certification a product
• Example of the certification of a system
• Example of the certification of an organization
• Plant certification
• People certification
• Benefits of certification vs. no certification
• How much independence and competence is needed
• Reliability certification vs. safety integrity certification
• Competency schemes
• The influence of EMC, electrical safety, and environmental safety on functional safety
• Etc.

On research level the following could be imagined:

• A comparison of different risk analysis techniques
• A comparison of different reliability techniques
• A comparison of different test strategies
• A comparison of different safety standards or concepts
• The benefits of uncertainty analysis
• The benefits of sensitivity analysis
• Latest developments in reliability theory
• The practical benefit of quantitative reliability study
• Process availability vs. safety availability
• Common cause analysis
• New tools suitable for safety analysis

There are many other topics than be addressed and the authors are certainly encouraged to propose them.