With the increasing complexity of aerospace systems, the engineer has fewer opportunities to gain experience and insight from previous projects. Therefore, computer simulation is a major avenue for training and decision-making support in the design of future aerospace structural concepts. Those structures will most likely be nonhomogeneous, anisotropic, and composed of passive and active materials. New approaches will have to address the complexities inherent to the actual structure while providing the computational characteristics necessary for their integration in a multidisciplinary environment. With this in mind, Prof. Cesnik's main research interests are in the general field of structural mechanics, structural dynamics, and aeroelasticity, with emphasis on design-oriented methodologies, as reflected in the following activities.
Aeroelastic analysis is an essential part of any aircraft multidisciplinary design.
The structural model used to discretize the wing and other components of the aircraft is usually a combination of plates, membranes, rods, shear panels, etc. However, this type of discretization, while accounting for some details of the aircraft component, results in high mesh preparation time and high computational costs. The perfect match between the structural and aerodynamic models allows for a reduced order model while preserving the fidelity required to characterize the aircraft plant. The use of active materials embedded in a composite structure provides a means of actively controlling its behavior, though increasing the complexity of its analysis even more. The designer would not have to bear either the cost of 3-D finite element discretization or the loss of accuracy inherent in any simplified representation of the actual structure.