Aerodynamics of Low Reynolds Number Flyers

Low Reynolds number aerodynamics is important to a number of natural and man-made flyers. Birds, bats, and insects have been of interest to biologists for years, and active study in the aerospace engineering community, motivated by interest in micro air vehicles (MAVs), has been increasing rapidly. The primary focus of this book is the aerodynamics associated with fixed and flapping wings. The book consider both biological flyers and MAVs, including a summary of the scaling laws-which relate the aerodynamics and flight characteristics to a flyer's sizing on the basis of simple geometric and dynamics analyses, structural flexibility, laminar-turbulent transition, airfoil shapes, and unsteady flapping wing aerodynamics. The interplay between flapping kinematics and key dimensionless parameters such as the Reynolds number, Strouhal number, and reduced frequency is highlighted. The various unsteady lift enhancement mechanisms are also addressed, including leading-edge vortex, rapid pitch-up and rotational circulation, wake capture, and clap-and-fling.

Wei Shyy is the Clarence L. "Kelly" Johnson Collegiate Professor and Chairman of the Department of Aerospace Engineering at the University of Michigan. He also taught at the University of Florida, as Distinguished Professor and Department Chair. He is the author and coauthor of books and articles dealing with computational and modeling techniques involving fluid flow, aerodynamics, propulsion, interfacial dynamics, and moving-boundary problems. He is the General Editor of the Cambridge Aerospace Series (Cambridge University Press), and is a Fellow of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics and the American Society of Mechanical Engineers. Yongsheng Lian, Jian Tang, and Dragos Viieru are research scientists at the University of Michigan. They have done original research in flexible-wing and aerodynamics interactions: flapping-wing aerodynamics; laminar-turbulent transition; and unsteady, law Reynolds number fluid physics. Hao Liu is a Professor of Biomechanical Engineering at Chiba University in Japan. He is well known for his contributions to biological, flapping-flight research, including original publications on insect aerodynamics simulations.