The Future of Fixed Wing Aircraft

The NASA Fundamental Aeronautics Fixed Wing Program is addressing the challenges of enabling revolutionary energy-efficient improvements in transport aircraft. Engineers and researchers are reducing noise while increasing
engine capability. Exciting new structural designs and technologies are all part of this program that will effect anyone who flies on future aircraft.

[@NectareanSpirit]

Excellent episode! Thanks NASA for all your fantastic work!

[@dannz2603]

Thank you for posting this great documentary, I love seeing the future being built now, working in this section of NASA must be a dream come true. Keep up the good work.

[@alexcoles9026]

WOW awesome!!

[@fanozungu9684]

This is grate hope will see these planes in Africa as well.The world is changing in aviation dramatically,well done NASA.From SA.

[@nirmalakrishnan2599]

Superb ....tq from Malaysia

[@FoodieRSA]

EXCELLENT video! Made my synapses snap on feel good. Thank you. D

[@NASAXrocks]

Thanks Frederick!

[@peachtrees27]

Thank you thank you thank you for giving so much professional attention to the lesser-known aeronautics development going on right now. NASA makes the future exciting, as you show so beautifully here. This private pilot can't wait to see these ideas at Oshkosh 2020!

[@NASAXrocks]

Thanks for the comment Pete. We here at NASA X love to fly as well. Hope you've been enjoying the series, we start airing on a few select airlines this month. Take care, hope to see you in Oshkosh.

[@zer0g77]

Pete Kuhns

[@akashssmenon]

Shame the virus had to cancel the airshow

[@BosonCollider]

When they talked about alternative fuels I got this weird picture in my head of airports smelling like chicken.

[@matekochkoch]

+BosonCollider Chemtrail conspiracy Level II: chicken and french fries trails to mainpulate mankind. I think this could really work.

[@fidenciovelasco8978]

Buenos videos grsias

[@wedgeantilles7731]

Thank you NASA! We ❤❤❤ you all!

[@Elwin3918]

Thank you for these thrilling designs they superb

[@hko2006]

Would be perfect with subtitles.

[@drstrange2292]

the turbofan design in my opinion is the best and most efficient, using the current technology's of most engines used like the Rolls Royce. i would have the generator built into the engines, that would power a stack of solid state batteries (not lithium ion tech but a different type) , which could reduce weight, also reducing the amount of batteries required as there is constant power being generated, once the aircraft is a cruising speed and altitude the engines could be rolled back dramatically, reducing fuel waste, noise and overall cost to companies. once the turbofans are engaged or are increased in power, a regulator could then distribute power to the turbofans that are under more load and decreasing the speed of those that aren't producing the thrust based on air pressure over the aircraft and other factors, with high torque energy efficient motors a gear system could then be used to maintain aircraft speed but with the reduction in battery usage, potentially increasing the life and charging cycles of the batteries. basically provide the energy were it is required but without causing high level of current draw, which could be a disaster as it will produce a thermal faults..or a ball of so and so tonne's falling out the sky. i have tried to explain it, but it's way better in my head. hold my beer and i'll do it.

[@DANTHETUBEMAN]

You have a contrail measuring airplane 🛫, cut you can't measure chemtrails?

[@Prof.Megamind.thinks.about.it.]

...just out of curiosity... Am I supposed to believe that "Active-Wing-Control" is better than MCAS , where "...nothing can go wrong...go wrong...go..." ? D.H.

[@j.n3267]

12:30 EMBRAER Legacy. Nice aircraft!!!

[@SIC-SEMPER-TYRANNIS]

I'm working on a mag lev prop electric prototype personal drone with forward rotor tilt gliding capabilities.

[@SIC-SEMPER-TYRANNIS]

Ready to blow the Ehang models out of the air.

[@johannesgoetzen]

6 Years later: Airplanes haven't changed

[@kareembux643]

I love nasa

[@DawgPro]

Interesting ! The process used at 2:21, can someone point me to it's name ?

[@myotherusername9224]

There's nothing happening at 2:21. What does this process look like?

[@wilfredocoquioco6828]

MAYBE YOU CAN MAKE THE ENGINE THRUST VECTORING .....

[@boogerking7411]

Does companies like boeing buy nasa's design so they could manufacture it and sell it or do they pay nasa royalties?

[@koc988]

No it's a joint design usually

[@kevsthings8328]

Wing trusses were an old idea that died out and now they are the future lol

[@Elnufo]

You need some gigajillions of processors to calculate that long, thing wings are more efficient? wow.

[@Doggeslife]

7 years later, and still flying the same thing. The Blended Wing Body concept will never make a good passenger aircraft. Evacuating a BWB in an emergency could be a challenge. No windows. I've seen concepts with windows on the leading edge, but could you imagine the passenger's response at the first large and gruespme bird strike? Even worse if the bird penetrates as they have done many times to aircraft windshields and canopies. Passengers closer to the wing tips will feel a lot more vertical motion as the plane rolls or the wing dips and rises in turbulence. I'm sure I could come up with more, but that will do for now. FedEx or UPS hauling cargo? Fine. American Airlines? Forget it.

[@Mike588]

Why not just go straight to electro revitics propulsion and use large triangle shaped crafts, that can carry 500 to 1000 passengers and cargo. NASA's space program, already has the technology. Has someone missed the memo.

[@symmetry08]

Even if battery cost and weight goes in reductions, that is not enough to justify it adoption into aeronautics. Electric generation and the battery, all those things cannot be able to progress in near future as viable tech for flight. Jet engine is very efficient per weight. Electric motors can be placed to assist in to take off airplane, but that is it. It won't help to fly far ( dead weight ). It would be better if airports, instead start to build a catapult system, along conventional take off lane, where those electric push mechanisms could be utilized for better advantages, sitting on rail systems that can swivel according to direction of the wind so that airplanes have less disturbance upon take off from platform that also spare tires from wear. Electric motors can handle those weights, and regeneration will slow it down and recover some energy.

[@LAIKASUEZ]

Says the person NOT working at NASA

[@lucamuller6729]

symmetry08 You may want to look at the company called Pipistrel, they work with Siemens and are really pushing the boundaries. Already having a working Pure Electric Training Aircraft and working on a Hybrid Version of their Panthera really shows how they are serious about it. Electric propulsion is simply put very underdeveloped in comparison to conventional propulsion.

[@depj1000]

Only windows for the first class seats. the rest are just cargo in that design. Sorry but I don't want just a video screen to see out.

[@JFrazer4303]

Maybe it compensates that it's a cheaper seat on a faster, safer plane that can get you into smaller regional airports. Cargo and the Military don't care about windows. Most recent NASA sponsored work on these by dzyne technologies, is for a ~30-seat mid-size twin, and windows aren't a problem.

[@michaelsmitten302]

One great engineering maxim is that you cannot get something for nothing. Energy cannot be created or destroyed. So what is used to generate the electricity to charge the batteries? It all sounds good to the layman, but one needs to understand that batteries need charging and that will involve some process of generation involving burning fuel. Indeed, since there are losses in this process, we are now using two lots of losses instead of the direct inefficiency. Firstly we generate electricity, involving losses, then we charge gatteries, involving inefficiency, then we convert that energy into thrust. Why not use the power that charges the batteries to power the plane in the first place, and cut out the middle process? I suspect the real reason is that NASA is government funded and needs to, at least, appear to be "green" though carbon dioxide is essential for life and no more a pollutant than oxygen.

[@JFrazer4303]

Eventually, Solar Power Satellites. For now, even home-grown coal & neutrons are better than Saudi oil. For now, you cannot hope to burn fuel in a vehicle, as cleanly and efficiently as at a stationary power plant. All things considered, you're better off producing electricity and ship[ping it, rather than handling fuel at every step of the process of the infrastructure. The gains in efficiency (including dealing with waste products) are great enough that the losses in going to a battery in a plane, are less. A vehicle would be 10X bigger, and 90% of it would be engine and waste processing, to get the performance of burning the fuel at a stationary site. Forget about CO2. What about unburned hydrocarbons, soot, NOX, insoluble lead salts and all the weird PAH and volatiles? Oil is too valuable for the complex soup it is, to be expended so inefficiently for our primary transportation energy. Also by relying on oil, we're playing the Saudi's game, and they have the winning hand. We can't control the price because they do, they can bend us over or force us to our knees to "service" them because they've got the winning hand. I for one don't like being a second-rate power under the control of some sick, twisted, racist, backwards royal family. I question not only the patriotism but the sanity and mental strength of anybody who wants us to be held under control of them and have them elbows-deep in our politics (both parties). GTFO my country if that's how you want to live. We know without doubt that the Saudi Royal family is guilty of fomenting and funding the very bronze-age mythology and bloodthirsty ways of the terrorism we see every day. Whose side are you on?

[@DMJ52]

Spot on and well said ! At last some sense .......

[@koc988]

Well you can't very well breath co2 can you buddy I'd rather not get health problems from living next to an airport and shorten my life if I could help it