CASE STUDY /Ansys + Northrop Grumman“What gets me most excited is MDAO, which is calculating
system performance, checking requirements, andperforming design trade-offs in a very quantitative fashion.
We have a flexible model for evaluating trade studies,
performing system optimization, and system verification
for phased array antenna systems.”
John Hodge
Senior Principal RF Engineer / Northrop Grumman

CASE STUDY

Northrop Grumman Corp. Applies Model-Based Systems
Engineering to the Development of Phased Array Antennasto Improve Design Time and Quality
The United States Department of Defense (DoD) distributed a “Digital Engineering Strategy” reportin 2018, which stated: “To help ensure continued U.S. technological superiority, the Department istransforming its engineering practices to digital engineering, incorporating technological innovations into
an integrated, digital, model-based approach.”
To meet this demand, Northrop Grumman has begun implementing an integrated, model-based
approach to develop phased array antenna sensor systems. Phased array antenna sensors are essential
to all types of wireless communication, radar, and electronic warfare. Due to the wide variety of uses,
multifunctionality, and applications of these devices, they have become more complex to design and test.
/ Challenges
Northrop needed to reevaluate and redevelop the way requirements werecommunicated to analysis to reduce the document-intensive engineering process.
The goal was to:• Automate and integrate the individual engineering disciplines into one workflow.
• Use an integrated workflow to run a multitude of trade studies to locate theoptimal design.
• Connect systems requirements to automated workflows to calculate performance,
check requirements, and perform design trade-offs studies.

/ Ansys Products Used
• ModelCenter/ Engineering Solution
Northrop Grumman needed a solution to improve their engineering workflows thatmatch content physics-based analysis to the systems requirements. The first stepwas connecting the analysis models from different disciplines to create modular
building blocks.
Next, they created a streamlined connection from the systems architecture models(SAM) to engineering analysis. ModelCenter® automated the workflows andconnected these workflows to the SysML (SAM) models.
The fully integrated system can calculate performance, check requirements, andperform design trade-offs with ModelCenter. Northrop can run thousands ofuse cases to develop Pareto Front of cost verse performance using ModelCenter
visualization.

/ Benefits
Northrop Grumman’s development of a multidisciplinary phased array antennamodel with many interdependencies has improved the antennas’ quality, reduced
the time for design exploration, and provided adherence to the systems architecture
model. Northrop can perform simulation analysis of a single solution in minutes
compared to hours previously.

Ansys + Northrop Grumman //2

They have eliminated transcription errors through automated connections
between models, which has reduced time to run simulations and increased thequality of the final product. The results are:
• Improved technical communication• Improved design quality• Increased productivity• Reduced design and execution risk

/ Company Description
Northrop Grumman solves the toughest problems in space, aeronautics,
defense, and cyberspace to meet the ever evolving needs of our customers
worldwide. Our 90,000 employees are Defining Possible every day using
science, technology, and engineering to create and deliver advanced systems,products, and services.

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