When cyclic stresses are applied to a material, even though the stresses do not cause plastic deformation, the material may fail due to fatigue. Fatigue failure is typically modeled by decomposing cyclic stresses into mean and alternating components. Mean stress is the time average of the principal stress. The definition of alternating stress varies between different sources. It is either defined as the difference between the minimum and the maximum stress, or the difference between the mean and maximum stress. Engineers try to design mechanisms whose parts are subjected to a single type (bending, axial, or torsional) of cyclic stress because this more closely matches experiments used to characterize fatigue failure in different materials.