Steve Wright <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
Looks like a solved case, this is why the B2 Stealth Bombers are costing you
$0.5 billion each.....................................
Spooky :-)
NASA UNVEILS "INTELLIGENT" TEST AIRCRAFT
Source: CNI News
[The following press release was issued by NASA on August 2. CNI News finds
this of interest on two counts: first, because it reveals that NASA and
associated agencies are working with highly exotic but operational
"waverider" technology capable of hypersonic speed and previously associated
with controversial claims concerning the "Aurora;" and second, perhaps more
interesting still, because NASA now reveals the existence of neural network
control systems in this test aircraft, a technology that some researchers
believe was derived from the back-engineering of alien spacecraft.]
NASA and the U.S. Air Force today unveiled a jet-powered aircraft equipped
with state-of-the-art flight control technologies that will demonstrate a
computerized flight control system that learns as it flies -- especially
important for the demands of ultra high-speed flight.
Called the Low-Observable Flight Test Experiment (LoFLYTE), the
8-foot-4-inch aircraft, announced at a briefing in Oshkosh, WI, has been
developed by Accurate Automation Corp., Chattanooga, TN, for NASA and the
Air Force. The program contracts are being administered through NASA's
Langley Research Center, Hampton, VA, and the Air Force Wright Laboratory,
Dayton, OH, under the Small Business Innovative Research Program. The
experimental LoFLYTE aircraft will be used to explore new flight control
techniques involving neural networks, which allow the aircraft control
system to learn by mimicking the pilot.
The model is a Mach 5 waverider design -- a futuristic hypersonic aircraft
configuration that actually cruises on top of its own shockwave. Waverider
aircraft, powered by airbreathing hypersonic engines, would fly at speeds
above Mach 4. LoFLYTE represents the first known flying waverider vehicle
configuration, but upcoming flight tests at NASA's Dryden Flight Research
Center, Edwards, CA, will be flown only at low subsonic speeds to explore
take-off and landing control issues.
The remotely-piloted aircraft has been designed to demonstrate that neural
network flight controls are superior to conventional flight controls. Neural
networks are computer systems that actually learn by doing. The computer
network consists of many interconnected control systems, or nodes, similar
to neurons in the brain. Each node assigns a value to the input from each of
its counterparts. As these values are changed, the network can adjust the
way it responds.
The aircraft's flight controller consists of a network of
multiple-instruction, multiple-data neural chips. The network will be able
to continually alter the aircraft's control laws in order to optimize flight
performance and take the pilot's responses into consideration. Over time,
the neural network system could be trained to control the aircraft. The use
of neural networks in flight would help pilots fly in quick-decision
situations and help damaged aircraft land safely even when controls are
partially destroyed.
The main objective of LoFLYTE is to demonstrate the utility of such a flight
control system that learns through experience, said Robert Pegg of Langley's
Hypersonic Vehicles Office. In addition to experimenting with neural
networks, the flight of the model also is key as a low-speed demonstration
of a hypersonic vehicle. "We're very interested in both outcomes, both the
neural net technology and the flight characteristics," he said.
"We see a big advantage to using this type of control system in a hypersonic
vehicle," Pegg said. "At those high speeds, things happen so quickly that
the pilot cannot control the aircraft as easily as at subsonic speeds."
The waverider was chosen as the testbed for the neural networks because the
configuration has an inherently high hypersonic lift-to-drag ratio. If
neural networks can control this "worst-case scenario" configuration, then
they should be able to handle virtually any other configuration. The
waverider configuration was also chosen because it allows for long
hypersonic cruise ranges of up to 8,000 miles. At an altitude of 90,000
feet, a Mach 5 waverider would fly at a rate of one mile per second.
Technologies being implemented in the LoFLYTE program could eventually find
their way into commercial, general aviation and military aircraft.
LoFLYTE TM A Next Generation Advanced Technology Demonstrator
A Next Generation Advanced Technology Demonstrator Accurate Automation
Corporation (AAC) is developing the LoFLYTE testbed aircraft.
LoFLYTE stands for Low Observable Flight Test Experiment. The LoFLYTE
program will demonstrate several advanced technologies within a series of
stealthy hypersonic aircraft. The first two aircraft will be jet powered and
will be unmanned. They will fly slower than the speed of sound, but each
will have the same "waverider" shape designed for Mach five flight.
Mach five is five times the speed of sound. The term "waverider" refers to
the fact that aircraft of this type ride on the shock waves that they create
as they fly above the speed of sound. Other supersonic and hypersonic
aircraft do not do this. These subsonic vehicles will demonstrate that an
aircraft with this innovative shape can take off, fly well at low speeds,
and land safely.
After successful demonstrations of these aircraft, we anticipate building a
full scale aircraft. This full scale aircraft will take off horizontally
like its two predecessors. Then it will use airbreathing engines to
accelerate to a cruising speed of Mach 5 and to climb to a very high
altitude. It will end its flight be landing on a conventional runway. Mach 5
is much faster than any aircraft with air breathing engines has ever flown.
The SR-71 "Blackbird" can only fly at a top speed slightly over Mach three.
Each aircraft in the series will be larger and more sophisticated than its
predecessor. The first LoFLYTE is a Remotely Piloted Vehicle, or RPV, which
is 8 feet 4 inches in length.
We are close to completing this aircraft and anticipate a first flight at
NASA Dryden Flight Research Center / Edwards Air Force Base in California
during the Summer of 1996. The flight of the first vehicle will provide
valuable information for the development and flight testing of the larger
LoFLYTE vehicles. The second LoFLYTE aircraft will be 23 feet in length.
The construction of the structural components of this vehicle is tentatively
scheduled to begin after the first flight of the small aircraft. This
vehicle will fly in 1997. (It) is the result of several Small Business
Innovation Research (SBIR) contracts from Navy, NASA, Air Force, and
National Science Foundation, as well as funding from commercial sources. The
LoFLYTE program will demonstrate the first known flight of a waverider
configuration airbreathing vehicle. The LoFLYTE technologies will find their
way into various future aerospace projects.
Some of the technologies, such as advanced sensors, new materials, and a new
type of computer, will be applied to other industries as well. Variations of
the new computer are already being sold by Accurate Automation and represent
our primary commercial product line.
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As big bird spreads the word, anybody with a heart votes love.
- Fluke.
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