A multi-disciplinary team of USC students has submitted proposals early this summer to 2009-10 American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) International Team Aircraft Design Competition. Responding to the Request for Proposal (RFP) issued by the AIAA, the team developed and submitted five unique designs (seen below) for a fuel efficient and environmentally friendly medium haul commercial aircraft. Intended for a service entry date of 2020, the new designs were requested to serve as a Boeing 737 and Airbus A320 replacement, closely replicating the present day challenge faced by the aerospace industry.

	Renderings of the 5 designs submitted by the USC team. First row, left to right: Albatross, Levant. Second row, left to right: Ibis, Waxwing, Egret. These designs show the use of advanced technologies including open fan engines, high aspect ratio wings, and swept forward wing planforms.

Drawing on the various disciplines of USC's Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering Department, as well as USC's School of Architecture and College of Letters, Arts and Sciences, 10 undergraduate students formed USC's Advanced Commercial Concepts team (UACC) to respond to the AIAA's request.

USC's Advanced Commercial Concepts team. Left to right: Chris Nsavu (Structures), Darin Gaytan (Aero-Performance), Phillip Adkins (Aeroacoustics), Kristina Larson (Configuration Management), Sina Golshany (Lead Designer), John Roehrick (Weight), Michael Zarem (Systems), Keith Holmlund (High-Speed Aerodynamics), Todd Erickson (Propulsion), Devin Lewis (Payload Integration).

Starting in September of 2009, team members were trained in various disciplines pertaining to aircraft design by team leader Sina Golshany, winner of the 2006-07 and 2007-08 individual aircraft design competitions. Subjects included aircraft configuration, performance, aerodynamics, weight, propulsion, noise, and environmental impact. Beginning in the spring semester and drawing on the skills developed in the fall, UACC team began work on the configuration of multiple advanced designs. This led to the selection of the five leading designs for further development. Following the end of the spring semester, UACC started a month long intensive effort to finalize the designs and prepare five 100 page proposals as well as the associated large scale drawings. The design process ended on June 10, with the submission of the proposals to AIAA competition committee. Results of the competition are expected to be released later in the fall semester.

The goal of this competition is to design a replacement for the best selling medium haul commercial aircraft; i.e. the Boeing 737 and Airbus A320. These single aisle planes have been the largest and most lucrative market in commercial aviation. In the 2009-2029 time frame, it is predicted that there will be a demand for 21 thousand new aircraft in this sector valued at $1.2 Trillion. Financially, this represents the single largest market in the aerospace industry. Hence, it is believed that there will be intense international rivalry in the development of next-generation aircraft to exploit this market, precipitating the use of revolutionary concepts in the fields of aerodynamics, propulsion, structures, systems, and alternative fuels.

In area of aerodynamics, UACC explored concepts pertaining to natural laminar flow and ultra high aspect ratio wings in order to reduce drag and increase the aerodynamic efficiency of the designs. Two of

Albatross, featuring high aspect ratio, natural laminar flow wings and open fan engines installed over the wings. Because of the large span, the wings must fold to allow compatibility with smaller airport gates.

the designs (Ibis and Levant) featured the novel concept of swept forward wings, , which induces lateral flow from the tips to the root of the wing thus promoting a significant reduction in drag.

In the field of propulsion, open fan engines, along with advanced geared turbofan engines were studied and utilized by UACC. The engines were analyzed and designed in great detail, and it was discovered that a 25% reduction in specific fuel consumption could be achieved by utilizing the integrated open fan engine concepts.

All of the configurations developed by UACC extensively utilized advanced composites as a means of reducing weight. Advanced composites also enabled the use of high aspect ratio/low sweep wings as well as the swept forward wings in the design.

In order to address the inefficiencies present in traditional aircraft systems such as energy losses experienced in hydraulic, pneumatic, and air conditioning systems, UACC implemented a fully electric architecture in all of its designs, replacing many of the traditional hydraulic/pneumatic functions of traditional system architectures. This allowed for significant reductions in the design weight and fuel burn.

The reduction in environmental impact also received particular attention in the project. Driven by the possible introduction of environmental taxation for the airline industry in the next two decades, UACC chose to develop technologies that substantially reduce the aircraft's impact on the environment at every stage of development and utilization, including the use of renewable energy and carbon neutral biofuels to power the aircraft.

Using these advanced concepts, UACC created conceptual designs that are projected to gain as much as 30% reduction in fuel burn and 40% reduction in direct operating cost.

Having finished their nine month endeavor, the UACC team members would like to express their gratitude for the tremendous support of their faculty mentors: Professors Ron Blackwelder, Oussama Safadi, Larry Redekopp, Blaine Rawdon, and Mark Page. In addition, the assistance provided by Marc Aubertine from USC's writing program and the members of the USC AeroDesign team was essentail in the planning and writing the proposal documents. Among many others, UACC would like to thank Dr. David Glasgow at the USC's office of undergraduate research and the Los Angeles branch of the AIAA's professional chapter chaired by Dean Davis for providing the essential funding for this research project to proceed. Last but not least the UACC team thanks USC's commitment to educational and professional excellence and they look forward to being a representative of the Trojan family.