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Spinoff story
Multidisciplinary Software to Help Take Aircraft to the Next Level
A real-world story of NASA technology finding a life beyond the mission.
About this technology
Overview
Future advances in commercial aircraft will require multidisciplinary analysis and optimization (MDAO), which finds optimal designs by considering how each aircraft component interacts with every other in light of multiple engineering fields. In order to simplify this complex process, Glenn Research Center developed OpenMDAO, an open source software program that allows researchers to perform these analyses without needing to be experts in MDAO. The University of Michigan is among those now using OpenMDAO for research into fuel-saving aircraft wing designs.