Student Highlight - Rachel Suitor

Rachel Suitor of University at Buffalo worked at NASA Armstrong Flight Research Center.

The PRANDTL-D aircraft is designed to have a bell-shaped span load. Prandtl’s theory showed that a bell-shaped span load would minimize drag as compared to the standard elliptical span load. To validate the theory behind the aircraft’s design, we ran tests during flight. The data from flight testing we did with the EPM system on the PRANDTL 3c aircraft has produced the expected span load on the wing. This effectively proves the theory that the designed wing twist minimizes induced drag.