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Volume 01 |
Issue 17 |
September 29, 2020
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Contactless Airports, Academic Aerospace R&D, Mobile Air Traffic Control
Welcome back to the Future of Aerospace, where each week we dive into a few of the trends rapidly defining the next generation of aircraft and aerial markets.
Lockheed Martin is preparing for its fourth GPS III satellite launch aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket tomorrow, Sept. 29, at 9:55 p.m. ET. PS III satellites will have three times better accuracy and up to eight times improved anti-jamming capabilities. Catch the live broadcast here.
THIS WEEK: Our newest editor Kelsey Reichmann explores current and future deployment plans for the use of various forms of biometrics and other contactless travel technologies at airports. (COVID-19 Impact)
We highlight three innovative research and development initiatives happening at several prominent aerospace engineering college programs throughout the United States. (Advanced Manufacturing, UAS Integration and Longshots)
Raytheon has a developed a new mobile air traffic control system that it says can be deployed within eight hours notice, designed to support air operations at humanitarian aid and disaster areas. (Public Policy)
Thanks for reading.
—The Future of Aerospace Team
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| Is Your Face the New Airline Boarding Pass? |
Image: SITA
Biometric technologies, which can use anything from fingerprints to facial scans for identification, are being floated as a solution for airports adjusting to life under COVID-19.
While some biometric technologies such as fingerprinting still require passengers to touch possibly contaminated surfaces, many like facial or retina scans can enable a contactless journey through the airport check-in process.
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- In a report published by Deloitte, an argument is made that airports must shift their traditional approach to deploying new technologies in order to use biometrics to resolve COVID-19 related health risks and concerns for air travelers.
- Contactless biometrics are already being used in airports. U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) uses its Facial Comparison Technology at 18 airports and seven seaports, according to its website. The use of biometric technology by CBP was initiated following the 9/11 Commission Report.
- Elizabeth Krimmel, Deloitte lead client service partner for the Transportation Security Administration: “When we think about biometrics, there's been a lot of talk before COVID about how can we accelerate it but also respect the privacy of passengers and comply with state, local, and international laws. That is almost being replaced by how can we accelerate biometrics to remove interaction between passengers and employees or security officers and how can we use biometrics for things like digital identity.”
- In August, Beijing Capital International Airport (BCIA) deployed biometric contactless technology known as SITA Smart Path. The SITA Smart Path technology allows passengers to move throughout the airport using just their faces as their boarding pass or passport. At BCIA, SITA claims to have been able to process over 400 passengers for an Airbus A380 flight in less than 20 minutes.
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Sean Farrel, Vice President of Passengers at Airports at SITA: “That is the second-largest airport in the world and we have a biometric solution deployed there which is in one of their international operations. “So it's that same kind of concept where you enroll with your biometric information as you're essentially checking in for your flight, whether that be at a counter or at a kiosk, as you go through the airport, as you drop your bags off, and as you go through security, and as you board the aircraft, you're being recognized by your face biometric during each step. So your face basically becomes your boarding pass.”
Read more on the future of biometrics at airports to enable contactless travel.
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| 3 Aerospace Research and Development Projects Happening at Universities in the US |
Image: MIT
Some of the aerospace industry’s most advanced groundbreaking future technologies and concepts are being researched and developed within academic labs and campuses at hundreds of universities in the U.S. right now.
A significant number of programs are performing never-seen-before operations using drones for everything from California Polytechnic State University’s initiative for identifying sharks that present risk to beachgoers and Colorado University Boulder’s project TORUS, a two-year partnership between CU Boulder and several other major universities and national research groups to use drones that will actively collect data about how and why tornadoes form.
Here, Future of Aerospace highlights three exciting research initiatives occurring at three different universities right now.
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)
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- Through a research project – partially supported by Airbus, ANSYS, Embraer, Lockheed Martin, Saab AB, Saertex, and MIT’s Nano-Engineered Composite aerospace Structures (NECST) Consortium – a team of researchers in January published a paper in the Journal of Advanced Materials Interfaces explaining how the application of electric current to carbon nanotube (CNT) film can produce the same type of composites being used on some of the newest in-service commercial airliners today at fraction of the cost.
- According to their paper, the composite materials typically used to produce aircraft wings and fuselages are traditionally produced by taking multiple polymer layers and blasting them with temperatures as high as 750 degrees Fahrenheit inside of large ovens the size of four-story buildings in some cases.
- Because carbon nanotubes exceptional electrical, mechanical, and optical properties, they can be exploited to produce the same type of aerospace-grade composites used in the A350. The MIT team, lead by the paper’s lead author and MIT postdoc Jeonyoon Lee, and Seth Kessler of Metis Design Corporation, an aerospace structural health monitoring company based in Boston, used what they describe as an out-of-oven (OoO) technique.
• Because carbon nanotubes exceptional electrical, mechanical, and optical properties, they can be exploited to produce the same type of aerospace-grade composites used in the A350. The MIT team, lead by the paper’s lead author and MIT postdoc Jeonyoon Lee, and Seth Kessler of Metis Design Corporation, an aerospace structural health monitoring company based in Boston, used what they describe as an out-of-oven (OoO) technique.
MIT postdoc Jeonyoon Lee: "We've checked the internal morphology, thermophysical and mechanical properties of the manufactured composites, which includes void quantification, degree of cure, and interlaminar strength testing."
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| Raytheon Develops New Mobile Air Traffic Control for Military, Humanitarian Use |
Image: Raytheon
Air traffic control (ATC) challenges may abound in remote regions and areas hit by disasters. To address this problem, Raytheon is pitching its Deployable ATC Automation and Communications System (DAACS).
Mobile ATC systems, such as DAACS, may find a significant market for expeditionary military forces, as they do not rely on existing infrastructure and can use generator or shore power. Raytheon said that technicians can set up DAACS in eight hours or less.
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- The U.S. Air Force started testing DAACS at Tyndall in March 2019 and used the system operationally there from Sept. 15 to Nov. 15 last year, said Scott Barbary, the director of air traffic systems surveillance for Raytheon Intelligence & Space.
- DAACS employs the Raytheon Standard Terminal Automation Replacement System (STARS) used by all DoD air traffic controllers at 175 locations around the world, per Raytheon.
- Scott Barbary, the director of air traffic systems surveillance for Raytheon Intelligence & Space: “The Air Force controllers and other controllers around the world that use STARS will see the same automation system that they use on a regular day basis.”
- DAACS comes in three, transportable, 20 foot ATC operations shelters – each with an ATC automation system, eight positions, VHF/UHF ground to air radios, a voice communication control system, and an information display system.
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