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CIRA, the Italian Aerospace Research Centre, in the framework of the national space program has carried out a feasibility study of a future re-entry spacecraft concept with automatic re-entry and landing operational capability. Such vehicle will be injected in a LEO orbit (i.e. 300km) by the VEGA launcher to execute few revolutions around the Earth and then perform an automatic re-entry flight. After de-boosting by the VEGA AVUM upper stage the vehicle will execute an autonomous flight from hypersonic to subsonic regimes allowing terminal area energy maneuvers, approach and landing on conventional runways. Different challenging design and technology performance shall be fulfilled by the vehicle configuration, materials and functional architecture. In particular, the vehicle shall exhibit improved aerodynamic and maneuverability characteristics together with innovative GNC approach allowing more flexibility in the re-entry trajectories, as compared to typical lifting re-entry vehicles.

CIRA is currently designing an Unmanned Aerial Research System, featuring high structural flexibility and light weight, code named HAPD. The project is framed within the Italian Aerospace Research Program, under the “UAV” Chapter. This UAS is mainly aimed at developing and validating advanced modeling methodologies for flexible aircrafts, where structural natural frequencies may overlap with flight dynamics frequencies. This peculiar condition challenges the command and control logics, as it requires an accurate modeling of the elastic behavior of the aircraft together with an actuation policy able to guarantee that maneuvering will not result in structural modes excitation. The vehicle will be given both remote piloting functions, either fully direct or mediated by a stability and control augmentation system, and fully autonomous flight capabilities.

Icing wind tunnels are one of the most important means of compliance available in support of aircraft icing certification process. A brand new Icing Wind Tunnel (IWT) has recently entered into service at the Italian Aerospace Research Centre (CIRA). During the facility commissioning, the main flow quality parameters and icing cloud characteristics have been measured. Prior to first customer testing, the icing cloud characteristics have been in-depth examined in the Main Test Section configuration. All measurements have been performed in a cross section located in the model centre of rotation. The icing cloud parameters have been measured using world accepted practices and instrumentation. The Mean Volume droplets Diameter (MVD) of the artificial cloud has been determined using an Airborne Droplet Analyser (ADA) system based on Phase Doppler Particle Analyser (PDPA) technique, while the Liquid Water Content (LWC) measurements have been carried out using a standard icing blade.