Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering News

Mechanical Engineering – Engineering Mechanics Graduate Seminar: September 13, 2012; 4:00 – 5:00 p.m., Room 112, ME-EM Building
Seminar Flyer

Dr. Chris Cotting, Master Instructor of Flying Qualities, U. S. Air Force Test Pilot School

Dr. Chris Cotting is the Master Instructor of Flying Qualities at the U. S. Air Force Test Pilot School in Southern California, where he is responsible for the aircraft dynamics, control, and handling qualities curriculum. He received a PhD in Aerospace Engineering from Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University in May of 2010, and has also earned a B. S. and M. S. in Aerospace Engineering from Mississippi State University. He is the recipient of three Project Achievement Awards from the Engineers Council Inc., the BAE Chairman’s Award for Innovation, and the Robert L. Wenning Outstanding Academic Instructor Award at USAF TPS. He was awarded the Best Paper in Atmospheric Flight Mechanics at the 43rd AIAA Aerospace Sciences Meeting (2005). He is a member of the AIAA Atmospheric Flight Mechanics Technical Committee. Dr. Cotting previously worked for NASA Dryden Flight Research Center as a Project Chief Engineer on both piloted and unpiloted aircraft. He also served as the X-43C chief of flight test and nonlinear control analysis lead for the X-43A Mishap Investigation Board. Before joining NASA, he worked at the Lockheed Martin Skunk Works on the X-33 (SSTO) and X-35 (JSF) programs. His research interests include handling qualities of piloted and unpiloted aircraft, as well as flying qualities analysis of aircraft nonlinear control systems.

An Overview of the USAF Test Pilot School, and A Framework for UAV Flying Qualities

The USAF Test Pilot School teaches flight test engineering with both a theoretical and applied approach. Our mission is to “Produce highly-adaptive, critical-thinking flight test professionals and future senior leaders to lead and conduct full-spectrum test and evaluation of aerospace weapon systems.” This seminar will introduce the Test Pilot School and research opportunities at Test Pilot School. This seminar will also discuss current topics in aircraft flying qualities. Flying qualities metrics were originally created to standardize and predict the performance of the human/aircraft system for a given task. As UAVs have become widely used, tools to predict their performance are also required. A discussion of whether or not piloted standards are applicable to UAVs will be presented as well as a framework for creating new UAV standards.
Dr. Chris Cotting is the Master Instructor of Flying Qualities at the U. S. Air Force Test Pilot School in Southern California, where he is responsible for the aircraft dynamics, control, and handling qualities curriculum. He received a PhD in Aerospace Engineering from Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University in May of 2010, and has also earned a B. S. and M. S. in Aerospace Engineering from Mississippi State University. He is the recipient of three Project Achievement Awards from the Engineers Council Inc., the BAE Chairman’s Award for Innovation, and the Robert L. Wenning Outstanding Academic Instructor Award at USAF TPS. He was awarded the Best Paper in Atmospheric Flight Mechanics at the 43rd AIAA Aerospace Sciences Meeting (2005). He is a member of the AIAA Atmospheric Flight Mechanics Technical Committee. Dr. Cotting previously worked for NASA Dryden Flight Research Center as a Project Chief Engineer on both piloted and unpiloted aircraft. He also served as the X-43C chief of flight test and nonlinear control analysis lead for the X-43A Mishap Investigation Board. Before joining NASA, he worked at the Lockheed Martin Skunk Works on the X-33 (SSTO) and X-35 (JSF) programs. His research interests include handling qualities of piloted and unpiloted aircraft, as well as flying qualities analysis of aircraft nonlinear control systems.

Topic: An Overview of the USAF Test Pilot School, and A Framework for UAV Flying Qualities

The USAF Test Pilot School teaches flight test engineering with both a theoretical and applied approach. Our mission is to “Produce highly-adaptive, critical-thinking flight test professionals and future senior leaders to lead and conduct full-spectrum test and evaluation of aerospace weapon systems.” This seminar will introduce the Test Pilot School and research opportunities at Test Pilot School. This seminar will also discuss current topics in aircraft flying qualities. Flying qualities metrics were originally created to standardize and predict the performance of the human/aircraft system for a given task. As UAVs have become widely used, tools to predict their performance are also required. A discussion of whether or not piloted standards are applicable to UAVs will be presented as well as a framework for creating new UAV standards.

Mechanical Engineering – Engineering Mechanics Graduate Seminar: September 6, 2012; 4:00 – 5:00 p.m., Room 112, ME-EM Building

Dr. Ilias Belharouak
Materials Scientist Leader and Energy Storage Expert
Chemical Sciences and Engineering Division
Argonne National Laboratory

Dr. Ilias Belharouak is a Materials Scientist Leader and Energy Storage Expert in the Chemical Sciences and Engineering Division at Argonne National Laboratory, Illinois, USA. He published over 200 peer-reviewed publications, papers at professional society meetings, and patents. He is a reviewer for several international journals in the field of electrochemistry, batteries, and materials physics and chemistry. Dr. Belharouak was recognized with several awards including R&D-100 awards, Pacesetter awards, and Federal and State Laboratory Consortium Awards. Dr. Belharouak holds Ph.D. and Master’s Degrees in Materials Science from the Institute for Solid State Chemistry, National Center for Scientific Research, University Bordeaux 1, France; and a Bachelor’s Degree in Inorganic Chemistry, University Cadi Ayyad, Morocco.

Lithium Batteries: Current State and Beyond

Rechargeable lithium-ion batteries were first commercialized by Sony in early 90’s. The high cost of cobalt and relatively low specific capacity of LiCoO2 (140Ah/kg) have been major obstacles against the application of these batteries in transportation where the battery energy density should significantly increase to meet the goals for plug-in hybrid vehicles (PHEVs), and essentially for electric vehicles (EVs). Also, despite the abundance of iron and manganese, olivine LiFePO4 and spinel LiMn2O4 will not likely be adequate candidates since neither of them can provide enough gravimetric and volumetric energy densities for transportation applications. Therefore, research groups have been under the challenge of inventing and developing new advanced positive electrode materials whose main characteristics is to store more and more electricity per mass and volume. Of these materials, advanced composite materials were found to deliver a high reversible capacity (250Ah/kg) while being structurally and electrochemically stable upon charge and discharge. These thermally stable materials are considered as potential candidates to surmount the energy density shortfall of current lithium ion batteries. The journey for materials design and discovery will be unveiled in the light of the most recent developments in lithium-ion batteries. Also, the implementation of the very challenging lithiumsulfur and lithium-air batteries will be discussed.

Dr. Gustavo Gioia, from the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology Graduate University in Okinawa, Japan will give a presentation entitled “Linking energy spectra and mean-velocity profiles in wall-bounded turbulent flows”
on Thursday, Aug. 23 at 2:00 in 112 MEEM

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