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Sustainable Aviation

home_outline/Research/Research Areas/Sustainable Aviation
  • Research Areas
    • Aerodynamics & Propulsion
    • Autonomous Systems & Control
    • Computation
    • Space Systems
    • Structures & Materials
    • Sustainable Aviation
  • Shared Facilities
  • Multidisciplinary Centers
  • Research Opportunities for Students

Sustainable aviation is a multi-disciplinary field that seeks solutions to improve the environmental and societal impacts of air transportation. It aims to reduce aviation’s contribution to climate change through new practices and radical innovation. This specialization covers highly efficient aircraft designs, novel propulsion systems, green aircraft technologies, and energy-optimized flight operations to reduce aircraft energy consumption, noise, and emissions. Research applications include appropriate fidelity and system-level analysis of advanced concept aircraft, electrified and hydrogen-powered aircraft, sustainable aviation fuels, renewable and alternative energy sources, improved air traffic management, emissions, and noise.

At Michigan, research and education in this specialization draw from the expertise of other research areas such as aerodynamics, propulsion, systems design, computation, autonomous systems, controls, structures, and materials. This brings a holistic approach that accounts for the life-cycle impact of greenhouse gas emissions in the design, operation, and sustainment of new aircraft concepts. Michigan’s sustainable aviation research programs involve collaboration with the aerospace industry and government.

  • Sustainable Aviation Faculty
  • Sustainable Aviation Research Groups

SUSTAINABLE AVIATION FACULTY

Carlos E. S. Cesnik

Clarence L. (Kelly) Johnson Professor

Dennis Bernstein

James E. Knott Professor

George F. Halow

Professor of Practice

Gokcin Cinar

Gökçin Çınar

Assistant Professor

Ilya Kolmanovsky

Professor

Joaquim R. R. A. Martins

Professor

Karthik Duraisamy

Associate Professor

Krzysztof Fidkowski

Professor

Max Z. Li

Visiting Assistant Professor

Venkat Raman

Professor

SUSTAINABLE AVIATION RESEARCH GROUPS

Active Aeroelasticity and Structures Research Laboratory (A2SRL)

Research areas: Multiphysics, multifidelity modeling, analysis, simulation (MS&A) of aero-servo-elastic systems; Multifunctional structural design and integration

Aero Project 9: Next Generation Space Propulsion Testing  

Faculty mentor: Prof. Benjamin Jorns

Prerequisites:

  • Hands-on project work in both mechanical and electrical engineering.
  • Programming experience in MatLab and LabView.

Description:

The purpose of this project is to assist the faculty mentor and his graduate students in a series of experimental campaigns planned over the summer.  The goal is to perform performance and plasma measurements for several new electric thruster concepts under development at Plasmadynamics and Electric Propulsion Laboratory.  Tasks may include probe construction, data analysis, or thruster development.

Research Mode: TBD

Integrated Design of Environmentally-friendly Aerospace Systems (IDEAS) Lab

The Integrated Design of Environmentally-friendly Aerospace Systems (IDEAS) Lab is directed by Professor Gokcin Cinar. Research at IDEAS Lab aims to bring a holistic approach that accounts for the system-level and life-cycle impact of greenhouse gas emissions in the design and operation of unconventional aircraft concepts. Revolutionary technologies, such as electrified propulsion and hydrogen combustion, open up a new and exciting design space with many challenges and uncertainties. 

At IDEAS Lab, we use physics-based modeling, probabilistic and statistical methods, and systems engineering principles to analyze, understand and design the complex system behavior of an aerospace vehicle. We leverage probabilistic design methods to reduce the uncertainty associated with novel concepts in early design phases. We build reduced order models to expedite the analysis and simulation of large-scale systems. These techniques allow us to perform sensitivity analysis, visualize tradeoffs, and explore a vast and uncharted design space under varying constraints at the early design stages.

Aero Project 9: Next Generation Space Propulsion Testing  

Faculty mentor: Prof. Benjamin Jorns

Prerequisites:

  • Hands-on project work in both mechanical and electrical engineering.
  • Programming experience in MatLab and LabView.

Description:

The purpose of this project is to assist the faculty mentor and his graduate students in a series of experimental campaigns planned over the summer.  The goal is to perform performance and plasma measurements for several new electric thruster concepts under development at Plasmadynamics and Electric Propulsion Laboratory.  Tasks may include probe construction, data analysis, or thruster development.

Research Mode: TBD

Multidisciplinary Design Optimization Laboratory

Research areas: Aircraft design, Multidisciplinary design optimization, computational fluid dynamics

Aero Project 9: Next Generation Space Propulsion Testing  

Faculty mentor: Prof. Benjamin Jorns

Prerequisites:

  • Hands-on project work in both mechanical and electrical engineering.
  • Programming experience in MatLab and LabView.

Description:

The purpose of this project is to assist the faculty mentor and his graduate students in a series of experimental campaigns planned over the summer.  The goal is to perform performance and plasma measurements for several new electric thruster concepts under development at Plasmadynamics and Electric Propulsion Laboratory.  Tasks may include probe construction, data analysis, or thruster development.

Research Mode: TBD

Computational Aerosciences Laboratory

Research areas: Analysis & Design of Electrified aircraft (E-VTOL) specfically; Fuel Cell modeling and control

Aero Project 9: Next Generation Space Propulsion Testing  

Faculty mentor: Prof. Benjamin Jorns

Prerequisites:

  • Hands-on project work in both mechanical and electrical engineering.
  • Programming experience in MatLab and LabView.

Description:

The purpose of this project is to assist the faculty mentor and his graduate students in a series of experimental campaigns planned over the summer.  The goal is to perform performance and plasma measurements for several new electric thruster concepts under development at Plasmadynamics and Electric Propulsion Laboratory.  Tasks may include probe construction, data analysis, or thruster development.

Research Mode: TBD

Computational Fluid Dynamics Group

Research areas: Computational fluid dynamics, aerodynamics, reduced models for aircraft analysis and design

Aero Project 9: Next Generation Space Propulsion Testing  

Faculty mentor: Prof. Benjamin Jorns

Prerequisites:

  • Hands-on project work in both mechanical and electrical engineering.
  • Programming experience in MatLab and LabView.

Description:

The purpose of this project is to assist the faculty mentor and his graduate students in a series of experimental campaigns planned over the summer.  The goal is to perform performance and plasma measurements for several new electric thruster concepts under development at Plasmadynamics and Electric Propulsion Laboratory.  Tasks may include probe construction, data analysis, or thruster development.

Research Mode: TBD

Laboratory for Air Transportation,
Infrastructure, and Connected Environments (LATTICE)

The Laboratory for Air Transportation, Infrastructure, and Connected Environments (LATTICE) is directed by Visiting Associate Professor Max Li and is focused on identifying and addressing research problems that contribute towards a safer, more efficient, more resilient, and user-oriented air transportation system. Examples of research projects and areas of interest include modeling the disruption and recovery process within air transportation networks, developing advanced air traffic flow management models and mechanisms, control and optimization of networked systems, and systems engineering concepts for Advanced Air Mobility.

Aero Project 9: Next Generation Space Propulsion Testing  

Faculty mentor: Prof. Benjamin Jorns

Prerequisites:

  • Hands-on project work in both mechanical and electrical engineering.
  • Programming experience in MatLab and LabView.

Description:

The purpose of this project is to assist the faculty mentor and his graduate students in a series of experimental campaigns planned over the summer.  The goal is to perform performance and plasma measurements for several new electric thruster concepts under development at Plasmadynamics and Electric Propulsion Laboratory.  Tasks may include probe construction, data analysis, or thruster development.

Research Mode: TBD

OUR FACILITIES

Use our excellent facilities to do your research. Work with faculty who lead in their fields.

See Where We Work
Computer illustration of an airplane
The University of Michigan Aerospace Department’s wind tunnels have been a major tool in the research of many thousand of aerodynamic projects, such as testing wind gusts on air crafts, wing-let advancements, University of Michigan solar cars, University of Michigan SAE formula cars, and so forth. In this photo, Chris Chartier, Aerospace Senior Engineering Technician, demonstrates use of the wind tunnels. Photo: Joseph Xu, Michigan Engineering Communications & Marketing www.engin.umich.edu

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