Several years of effort on exploring shape memory alloys for airframe noise reduction have recently been summarized in a recent Case Study published by Software Cradle, a subsidiary of MSC Software and providers of SC/Tetra, which produces all CFD results associated with the project.
Coupling of SC/Tetra CFD with Abaqus FEA provides full fluid-structure interaction analysis of a slat cove filler concept through the full deployment and retraction processes.
[Read more…] about Research on SMAs for Airframe Noise Reduction Featured in MSC Software Case Study
SciTech conference, the biggest aerospace conference in the US with more than 4200 participants and 2000 technical papers. Representing the lab, PhD student Pedro Leal and Dr. Darren Hartl presented four technical papers related to the avian-inspired and EVA glove projects (all papers are listed below). 
As a means off blowing end-of-the-semester stress, the MAESTRO Team gathered at casa de Hartl for another round of morale building and pride crushing volleyball. A full 20 players participated in the four-team round-robin competition. In the end, the “Slat Cove Winners” (Scholten, Patterson, White, Garza, and French visiting student Thomas Thollot) and “HRBB Fully Loaded” (Brazilian visiting student Bia Borges, Pedro Savi, Hartl, Cabezuela, and Alyssa Saenz) tied with three wins and one loss each. A Wiffle Ball game followed, with Hartl (pitcher) learning that some students neglect to mention that they were high school baseball players on their resumés. The evening concluded with a Secret Santa gift exchange organized by Patrick Walgren.