MDAO model development for electrified transport aircraft

Postdoc project, 2025

Overview

We developed a series of multidisciplinary design, analysis, and optimization (MDAO) models for conceptual design optimization of electrified transport aircraft. This was a collaborative project with Electra, the University of Michigan, MIT, UC Irvine, and other partners, funded by NASA AACES 2050 program.

We expanded NASA’s Aviary, an open-source aircraft conceptual design software built on OpenMDAO, to model electrified aircraft. These included implementing components model for hybrid-electric propulsion systems, motors and generators, batteries, thermal manegement systems, and aero-propulsive couplings such as boundary layer ingestion benefits.

The diagram below shows major components/disciplines in electrified aircraft conceptual design and their system-level interactions. Our goal was to model these components in Aviary and OpenMDAO, and then optimize aircraft conceptual design while fully capturing multidisciplinary couplings.