Continuous morphing trailing-edge wing concept based on multi-stable nanomaterial

Morphing technology is one of the most effective methods to improve the flight efficiency of aircraft. Traditional control surfaces based morphing method is mature and widely used on current civil and military aircraft, but insufficiently effective for the entire flight envelope. Recent research on morphing wing still faces the challenge that the skin material for morphing should be both deformable and stiff. In this study, a continuous morphing trailing-edge wing with a new multi-stable nano skin material fabricated using surface mechanical attrition treatment technology was proposed and designed. Computational fluid dynamics simulation was used to study the aerodynamic performance of the continuous morphing trailing-edge wing. Results show that the lift coefficient increases with the increase of deflection angle and so does the lift-drag ratio at a small angle of attack. More importantly, compared with the wing using flaps, the continuous morphing trailing-edge wing can reduce drag during the morphing process and its overall aerodynamic performance is improved at a large angle of attack range. Flow field analysis reveals that the continuous morphing method can delay flow separation in some situations.