Recent Studies about Rotorcraft and Advanced Air Mobility

Abstract

Recent studies about rotary wings for next-generation rotorcraft, advanced air mobility, and Mars rotary aircraft are introduced. Due to recent technological innovations such as electrification, new applications of rotary-wing aircraft in aeronautics are expanding, and various new technologies are being researched and developed. This paper also surveys studies on aerodynamics, noise, and vibration of various kinds of rotorcraft, including the advanced air mobility vehicles, also known as eVTOL (electric Vertical Take-Off and Landing) aircraft, high-speed rotorcraft, and Mars helicopters. New airframe configurations such as multirotors and utilization in extraterrestrial environments may encounter new aerodynamic effects that were not previously well understood, which influence the performance and noise characteristics of the aircraft. To address these issues, research and developments have been conducted based on experimental and numerical simulation technologies. For multirotors, aerodynamic interferences between rotors and between rotor and fuselage are investigated to improve the flight performance and reduce noise. In addition, low drag technologies taking account of the interferences between aerodynamic components need to be explored further, as the required propulsion power is directly related to the airframe drag for the next-generation rotorcraft with complex configurations.