Riso outlined the promise and challenges of new lighter-weight and energy efficient aircraft designs.
As she was sitting in the audience at the International Forum on Aeroelasticity and Structural Dynamics (IFASD) in 2015, Cristina Riso remembers feeling energized and inspired by the expert speakers she heard.
She never thought she would be in their place less than a decade later with the chance to inspire future researchers. Yet she found herself there in June, delivering a keynote focused on advances in aeroelastic prediction and design optimization for next generation aerospace vehicles.
“It is exciting to think that my keynote speech could inspire others, especially newer generations of graduate students and postdocs in my field,” said Riso, assistant professor in the Daniel Guggenheim School of Aerospace Engineering.
“Delivering a keynote was particularly meaningful to me as the IFASD is the most important international event for engineers and researchers in aeroelasticity and structural dynamics, and it has been an opportunity to reflect on my contributions to my field and outline my vision for the future.”
The basis of Riso’s presentation was this challenge: To increase the energy efficiency and sustainability of commercial aviation, engineers are developing lighter-weight, more flexible aerospace vehicle designs. However, these new vehicles experience larger deflections under normal flight conditions, challenging current aeroelasticity and structural dynamics models and analysis methods.
Meanwhile, Riso said, new propulsion systems or unconventional aircraft geometries mean decades of design and flying experience do not apply in the same way.
“These challenges require us to improve aeroelasticity and structural dynamics models and analysis methods so they can accurately predict the behaviors of new aircraft,” she said, “and also develop new strategies to effectively use computational predictions earlier in the design phase of these configurations.”
In her keynote, Riso highlighted research developing new capabilities in these areas, such as advances in models that capture larger deflections and progress using design optimization principles for future aircraft.
Riso said tighter collaboration between academic, research, and industry organizations is required to tackle the complex aeroelasticity and structural dynamics challenges associated with new aircraft. And along with that, educational content must be kept up to date with the knowledge and tools students will need to model, analyze, and design these future configurations.
She told conference attendees it will be imperative to balance the foundational pillars of aeroelasticity and structural dynamics with the rapid pace of new developments in these fields while considering the limited time available in academic courses and the emergence of new ways of teaching and learning in the wake of the pandemic.
“While these are significant challenges,” Riso said, “they also present opportunities for the fields of aeroelasticity and structural dynamics to play a key role in shaping the future of aviation.”