Embodied Sentient Mechanomorphing for Agile Control in High-speed (e-SMACHs) Vehicles
Abstract
Morphing aircraft systems hold the potential to improve flight performance by optimally matching the vehicle s shape to the speed and environmental regime of the mission. However, conventional hinged mechanisms and actuator systems introduce significant cost, Size, Weight, and Power (c- SWaP) penalties that reduce the anticipated benefits in aerodynamic and operational performance. This trade-off is heightened in high-speed regimes where complex aerodynamic and thermal loads limit the attainable performance. Morphing structures offer opportunities to address c-SWaP penalties with the promise of a highly integrated system capable of maintaining optimal performance even in off-design conditions. To realize the promise of morphing structures a new paradigm in which structures, sensing, actuation systems, flight dynamics, and controls need to be concurrently optimized. An avenue to achieve this is the development of metastructures capable of providing sensory and information processing locally, thereby breaking the feedback loop driving the need for greater computation and communication power, while reconfiguring to impart state changes to the vehicle. Recently, a new class of multistable metastructures with many global stable states exhibiting environment responsiveness, information processing, and large shape reconfiguration capabilities has been discovered.
Document Details
- Document Type
- DoD Grant Award
- Publication Date
- Feb 06, 2025
- Source ID
- FA95502410339
Entities
People
- Andres Arrieta Diaz
Organizations
- Air Force Office of Scientific Research
- Purdue University
- United States Air Force