This paper discusses the use of control theory for optimum design of aerodynamic configurations. Examples are presented of the application of this msethod to the reduction of shock induced pressure drag on airfoils in two-dimensional transonic flow.

The aerodynamic performance of freely flying birds is inherently difficult to measure directly without interfering with their natural flight. Many current methods thus combine kinematic parameters derived from high-speed video with theoretical force and power models. However, these methods often require manual tracking of points in each frame of a video to obtain kinematic data. This project ut...

Aerodynamic theory has long been used to predict the power required for animal flight, but widely used models contain many simplifications. It has been difficult to ascertain how closely biological reality matches model predictions, largely because of the technical challenges of accurately measuring the power expended when an animal flies. We designed a study to measure flight speed-dependent a...

Reynolds number and thus body size may potentially limit aerodynamic force production in flying insects due to relative changes of viscous forces on the beating wings. By comparing four different species of fruit flies similar in shape but with different body mass, we have investigated how small insects cope with changes in fluid mechanical constraints on power requirements for flight and the e...

The state-space representation of an aerodynamic vortex lattice model is considered from a classical, system identiŽ cation perspective. By the use of an aerodynamic vortex model as a numerical simulator of a wind-tunnel experiment, both full-state and limited-state data or measurements are considered. Two possible approaches for system identiŽ cation are presented, and modal controllability an...

The state-space representation of an aerodynamic vortex lattice model is considered from a classical and system identification perspective. Using an aerodynamic vortex model as a numerical simulator of a wing tunnel experiment, both full state and limited state data or measurements are considered. Two possible approaches for system identification are presented and modal controllability and obse...

STATIC aeroelastic analysis capability that calculates A flexible air loads for generic configuration wings was developed. It was made possible by integrating a finite element structural analysis code (MSWNASTRAN) and a panel code of aerodynamic analysis based on linear potential flow theory. The framework already built in MSC/NASTRAN was used, and the aerodynamic influence coefficient matrix w...

A simple approach for computing unsteady aerodynamic forces from simulated measured strain data is proposed in this study. First, the deflection and slope of the structure are computed from the unsteady strain using the two-step approach. Velocities and accelerations of the structure are computed using the autoregressive moving average model, on-line parameter estimator, low-pass filter, and a ...