The group focuses on a variety of research and development directions in the area of conceptual aircraft design and multi-fidelity analysis and optimization to investigate potential future aircraft configurations and find design solutions to challenging problems of future aviation. The group research has two main scientific directions: conceptual aircraft design using a multi-fidelity approach and software and methodology development for early aircraft design stages.
The research direction has a strong focus on design space explorations, feasibility studies, and conceptual design of conventional and unconventional configurations for future goals of aviation. The group is working on a variety of design problems related to configuration design with potential future airframe and propulsion technologies to estimate the overall aircraft performance and quantify potential limitations and uncertainties. Multi-fidelity aircraft sizing assessments from the overall performance, aerodynamic characteristics, structural design, and flight dynamic behavior are the main goals of the applied conceptual design direction. Various multi-disciplinary and multi-fidelity optimization approaches are also used to enhance the knowledge of the design space and perform more comprehensive configuration studies.
To be able to assess various aircraft configurations, components, and technologies that are currently not implemented in production-level aircraft, a comprehensive framework with high analysis flexibility is required. The group is actively developing the Aircraft Design and Multi-Layer Analysis framework AD__Init__. The framework combines various design and analysis tools of different fidelity levels for early conceptual design stages. The framework is divided into three main layers, in which the first layer consists of low- to medium-fidelity methods for overall aircraft sizing and design initiation algorithms, the second layer focuses on physics-based methods and multi-disciplinary optimization with those methods, and the third layer utilizes high-fidelity open-source or commercial software packages. Methods and tools in each layer can be connected to each other to be used at particular design stages where their implementations are necessary. The group is focused on the development of internal tools, enhancements of existing software packages, and the development of scripts to automatize and connect methods from different layers in the most efficient way.
ADEMAO | Aircraft Design Engine based on Multidisciplinary Analysis and Optimization
CLIME | Scaled Flight Model for SE2A
SE² A JRG B5 | SE² A Excellence Cluster, Sustainable Energy-efficient Aircraft, Long-range aircraft configurations and technology assessments
Institute of Aircraft Design and Lightweight Structures
Hermann-Blenk-Straße 35
D-38108 Braunschweig
E-Mail: ifl@tu-braunschweig.de
Telephone: +49 531 391 9903