High transonic speed transport aircraft study

An initial design study of high-transonic-speed transport aircraft has been completed. Five different design concepts were developed. These included fixed swept wing, variable-sweep wing, delta wing, double-fuselage yawed-wing, and single-fuselage yawed-wing aircraft. The boomless supersonic design objectives of range=5560 Km (3000 nmi), payload-18 143 kg (40 000lb), Mach=1.2, and FAR Part 36 aircraft noise levels were achieved by the single-fuselage yawed-wing configuration with a gross weight of 211 828 Kg (467 000 lb). A noise level of 15 EPNdB below FAR Part 36 requirements was obtained with a gross weight increase to 226 796 Kg (500 000 lb). Although wing aeroelastic divergence was a primary design consideration for the yawed-wing concepts, the graphite-epoxy wings of this study were designed by critical gust and maneuver loads rather than by divergence requirements. The transonic nacelle drag is shown to be very sensitive to the nacelle installation. A six-degree-of-freedom dynamic stability analysis indicated that the control coordination and stability augmentation system would require more development than for a symmetrical airplane but is entirely feasible. A three-phase development plan is recommended to establish the full potential of the yawed-wing concept

Tropospheric Airborne Meteorological Data and Reporting (TAMDAR) Icing Sensor Performance during the 2003/2004 Alliance Icing Research Study (AIRS II)

NASA Langley Research Center and its research partners from the University of North Dakota (UND) and the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) participated in the AIRS II campaign from November 17 to December 17, 2003. AIRS II provided the opportunity to compare TAMDAR in situ in-flight icing condition assessments with in situ data from the UND Citation II aircraft's Rosemont system. TAMDAR is designed to provide a general warning of ice accretion and to report it directly into the Meteorological Data Communications and Reporting System (MDCRS). In addition to evaluating TAMDAR with microphysical data obtained by the Citation II, this study also compares these data to the NWS operational in-flight icing Current Icing Potential (CIP) graphic product and with the NASA Advanced Satellite Aviation-weather Products (ASAP) Icing Severity product. The CIP and ASAP graphics are also examined in this study to provide a context for the Citation II's sorties in AIRS II

T TAMDAR Sensor Validation in 2003 AIRS II

This study entails an assessment of TAMDAR in situ temperature, relative humidity and winds sensor data from seven flights of the UND Citation II. These data are undergoing rigorous assessment to determine their viability to significantly augment domestic Meteorological Data Communications Reporting System (MDCRS) and the international Aircraft Meteorological Data Reporting (AMDAR) system observational databases to improve the performance of regional and global numerical weather prediction models. NASA Langley Research Center participated in the Second Alliance Icing Research Study from November 17 to December 17, 2003. TAMDAR data taken during this period is compared with validation data from the UND Citation. The data indicate acceptable performance of the TAMDAR sensor when compared to measurements from the UND Citation research instruments. I

A bird's eye view... resistance in academia

This article deals with one sociologist's experience of gender inequality in the academy and examines different forms of resistance to it. Here, the author uses the concept of resistance to explore some of the ways faculty women respond to a situation of hierarchical and numerical male dominance. Focusing on faculty women within the hierarchical and numerically male dominated structures of academia, the author identifies seven types of resistance. It also compares the Irish trends as regards the proportion of women in academia to other countries. It is important to stress the methodological limitations of this paper. The author draws on personal observations of the position of faculty women in three of the five academic organisations in which she was employed at various times over the past 30 years (the early 1970s; the 1980s; and the 1990s respectively), initially as research assistant and more recently as professor. It thus can be seen as a personal account: there are 'no empirical findings in the positivist sense' (Lentin, 2000). Observations were not recorded systematically over the years and the possibility that they constitute a highly idiosyncratic perception of the academy cannot be eliminated. A focus on reflexivity and autobiography is part of an epistemological challenge to positivism (Lentin 1993 and 2000; Goode 1998) albeit one that has been viewed with considerable scepticism by many sociologists. Nevertheless, in a context where there are considerable sensitivities around the collection of qualitative data (because of the size of the country, the small number of academic institutions, and strong norms involving institutional loyalty) this approach is arguably an important source of insight