Mechanical, Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering

Upcoming Lecture

When: March 22, 2024, 1:00 pm

Where: SSOE Seminar room, NI 1027

 

Bioinspired UAV Morphing

Careful observation and tests of gliding avian species in nature have resulted in new thoughts on how to design morphing uninhabited air vehicles (UAV) and what morphing motions might make for better performance. An understanding of avian flight stability suggests a new approach to morphing aircraft design. Of interest is how to create these motions using smart materials to gain avian abilities. Coupled with new learning algorithms, methods for designing smart autonomous morphing airfoils for use in small UAVs are presented. Hardware based reinforcement learning (RL) techniques are used to teach a smart morphing wing to respond to gusts, following the inspiration of gliding gulls who respond immediately and autonomously to unknown changes in flow to maintain stability and control in unpredictable environments.  We strive to translate this knowledge to flight control of UAVs. Last, a way forward is suggested to create new class of structures: autonomous multifunctional structures. An outline of what is needed in terms of future research is presented.

Daniel J. Inman, Ph.D., Michigan State University (1980, Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering; 1975, MAT in Physics; 1970, B.S. in Physics) is the Harm Buning Collegiate Professor and former Chair of the Department of Aerospace Engineering at the University of Michigan. Formerly he was the Director of the Center for Intelligent Material Systems and Structures and the G.R. Goodson Professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Virginia Tech.  A former Department Chair of the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, State University of New York at Buffalo, he has held adjunct or visiting positions in the Division of Applied Math at Brown University, in Aerospace at the University of Bristol, UK, and in math at the University of Southern California.  Since 1980, he has published 9 books (on energy harvesting, vibration, control, statics, and dynamics), eight software manuals, 20 book chapters, over 410 journal papers and 674 proceedings papers, given 78 keynote or plenary lectures, graduated 70 Ph.D. students, and supervised more than 78 MS degrees.  He is a Fellow of the American Academy of Mechanics (AAM), the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME), the International Institute of Acoustics and Vibration (IIAV), and the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA). He is currently Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Intelligent Material Systems and Structures (1999-present), served as Editor-in-Chief of the ASME Journal of Vibration and Acoustics (1989-1999), the Shock and Vibration Digest (1998-2001), and the journal Shock and Vibration (1999-2010).  He won the ASME Adaptive Structures Award in April 2000, the ASME/AIAA SDM Best Paper Award in April 2001, SPIE Smart Structures and Materials Lifetime Achievement Award in March of 2003, and the 2007 ASME/Boeing Best Paper by the ASME Aerospace Division's Structures and Materials Committee. In September 2007, he received the ASME Den Hartog Award for lifetime achievement in teaching and research in vibration, the 2009 Lifetime Achievement award in Structural Health Monitoring and the ASME 2015 Rayleigh Lecture Award. His Google H-index is 104.

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