BLACKSBURG, Va. — Hockey helmets may be on the verge of a radical makeover, as scientists and engineers at Virginia Tech prepare a rating system that measures each brand’s and model’s ability to reduce the risk of concussion.

“After football, hockey is the sport that produces the highest rate of concussion,” said Dr. Stefan M. Duma, a Virginia Tech professor and the head of the university’s biomedical engineering department. “We want to produce a mechanism to try and reduce that risk of concussion.”

That mechanism is a five-point rating scale called the STAR system, which the Virginia Tech football team began applying to its helmets in 2011. While there is still disagreement on whether concussions can be reduced by improving helmets, the football rating system quickly became influential, leading manufacturers to substantially increase internal padding. Sales for five-star football helmets have soared, and those for low-rated helmets plunged.

Duma and Dr. Steven Rowson, who also teaches biomedical engineering at Virginia Tech and is a co-investigator in the project, have been conducting preliminary tests to perfect their methodology for hockey helmets for more than a year. They hoped to start testing hockey helmets in about a month and to release ratings for about 30 models this fall or winter.