Projets de recherche

The main idea of the project concerns electromechanical de-icing systems based on resonant actuators which should provide some significant advantages over existing solutions : reduce consumption, use only electrical power source, be compatible with any structures (metallic or composite).

The concept is based on the activation of resonant actuators (piezoelectric actuators e.g.) to create shear stresses at the substrate/ice interface to promote adhesive fractures or tensile stress to generate cohesive fractures. The objectives of our work is to understand the initiation and propagation of cohesive fractures in the ice and adhesive fractures at the interface ice/support, to give a methodology for computing voltages and currents of a piezoelectric de-icing system to initiate fractures, and to propose general design rules to favor propagation of fractures.

Some tests to validate our methodology have been performed in the iCORE icing wind tunnel of Airbus Central R&T in Munich. The video shows tests performed on a leading edge covered of glaze ice and excited at 22kHz, 25 kHz and 35kHz with different voltages to study the initiation and the propagation of fractures. The video also shows some results with a plater covered by a icephobic coating.

The options to improve the aircraft overall efficiency are manifold, ranging from distributed electric propulsion to an entirely new airframe design. The adoption of alternative power sources also promises vast possibilities in terms of synergetic propulsive integration. Moving away from the conventional tube-wing configurations will require a significant revamp of the evaluation methods and new means of calculations have to be investigated to improve their portability to new airframe designs. The integration of all these methods and tools into a streamlined evaluation platform represent a key milestone for an efficient multi-disciplinary optimization.
The objective of the work is to set-up a multidisciplinary design process that will identify the most promising solution for a regional aircraft in terms of airframe/propulsion layout and hybrid electric architecture.

New aircraft concepts that can contribute to the decarbonization of aviation and to the proposal of more flexible urban mobility are currently arousing great interest from aeronautical aircraft manufacturers and equipment manufacturers.

The first part of this project focuses on the multi-criteria and multi-stage assessment of the environmental impact of new aircraft through a Life Cycle Analysis of the airframe and main aircraft systems. The studied airplanes will be category CS23 (4-10 passengers) to regional (20-40 passengers).

The second study consists in the development of a tool called CAST (Climate and Aviation - Sustainable Trajectories) used to generate trajectories for aviation that are compatible with the Paris climate agreements.
https://cast.isae-supaero.fr

Great interest is currently shown in Vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) aircraft. These aircraft can eliminate the need for long runway infrastructure while ensuring the speed and endurance performance required for various types of applications and missions.

The objective of this thesis is to explore and assess jointly the effect of different control strategies for these multivariable systems and of the propulsion chain and flight control system specifications on a set of criteria.
The control strategies will be designed for improving robustness to failures and the safety of VTOL while meeting handling qualities and aircraft performance constraints.

Hysteresis is a phenomenon in which the value of a physical property lags behind changes in the effect causing it. Hysteresis is detrimental since it limits the system performances.

Overcoming the influence of the hysteresis on performances of aircraft systems is an arduous task because of significant variations of hysteresis characteristics with operating conditions (altitude, flow, pressure and temperature) and dispersions of system components characteristics. Another issue comes from the availability of sensors that do not always give a direct measure of the hysteresis influence.
This work tackles the issue of the control of high amplitude hysteresis phenomena in aircraft systems as well as the robustness assessment on system performances.