NFL awards researcher and young talent awards

Prizes awarded during digital research day of the Aeronautics Research Center Lower Saxony

New approaches in the area of ​​predicting airframe noise, the operational safety of flying objects and the design of sustainable lightweight structures as well as state-of-the-art flight measurement technology - four research projects in various areas of aerospace research make a contribution to these topics. They were awarded the Hermann Blenk Research Prize as well as the Karl Doetsch Young Talent Awards and the VDI Aerospace Award. The prizes were awarded during the first digital research day of the Aeronautics Research Center Lower Saxony (NFL) of the Technical University of Braunschweig on November 23, 2020.

Hermann-Blenk Research Award for Dr.-Ing. Paul Bernicke

Dr. Paul Bernicke examined the development and propagation of airframe noise with the help of overset LES simulations as part of his doctorate at the Institute for Fluid Mechanics at the TU Braunschweig. Its methodology enables a realistic reproduction of the formation of turbulence with a short computing time. In the course of the validation of the method with the help of a symmetrical airfoil it turned out that the applied method agrees very well with the real far-field acoustics and the local turbulence statistics. Based on this, it was possible to predict the noise reduction of a porous wing edge as well as an elongated slat geometry. For developing this outstanding approach, that was especially important for the design of quieter aircrafts, Dr. Bernicke was awarded the Hermann Blenk Research Prize this year which is endowed with 5,000 euro.

Karl-Doetsch Young Talent Awards for Felix Witt and Martin Laubner

In his master's thesis at the Institute for Flight Guidance of the TU Braunschweig and the Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt (PTB) Felix Witt dealt with the development of the opto-mechanics of a new laser hygrometer - for measuring air humidity - for the D-ILAB research flight. He was able to prove in experimental investigations that the spectroscopic resolution of the new hygrometer showed very good agreement with reference systems and met all measurement requirements. Furthermore, he developed an aerodynamically optimized casing for flight tests with the hygrometer with which a flow similar to that in a free flow is guaranteed in the measuring plane. Felix Witt completed a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering at the Hamburg University of Applied Sciences from 2013 to 2017 and completed a master's degree in Computational Sciences in Engineering at the TU Braunschweig from 2017 to 2020. 

In his master's thesis, Martin Laubner shows how unmanned helicopters can stick better to the flight area limits. In his work at the DLR Institute of Flight System Technology, he investigated the applicability of a physically motivated limit indicator model, in which model errors are taken into account by adjusting the indicator value. The final assessment of his flexible method comes to the conclusion that the latter is more suitable than models with fixed flight range limits, since variable flight masses in particular can be taken into account individually. Martin Laubner studied aerospace engineering at DHBW Ravensburg from 2013 to 2016 and completed his studies with a master's in aerospace engineering at TU Braunschweig in 2019. The Karl-Doetsch Young Talent Awards are endowed with 1,000 euro each.

VDI Aerospace Award for Lajos Fohlmeister

In his student thesis, Lajos Fohlmeister at the Institute of Aircraftdesign and Lightweight Structures at the TU Braunschweig dealt with the mechanical characterization of wood veneer composites using classic laminate theory and failure criteria. He looked at the transferability of the design methods from fiber composite materials to natural wood veneers and carried out a three-point bending test with two double-T-beams to check the theory, which brought new insights into the design of sustainable lightweight structures. For this work he received the VDI aerospace award, which is endowed with 1,000 euro. Lajos Fohlmeister has been studying mechanical engineering and aerospace engineering at the TU Braunschweig since 2013.

 

Source: TU Braunschweig/ Pressinformation