Dr. Hui Hu has received 2009 AIAA Best Paper Award presented by AIAA Applied Aerodynamics Technical Committee. Hu, an assistant professor in aerospace engineering at Iowa State University, wrote the article with his former graduate student, Jeffrey Murphy, (M.S., summer 2008), who is now working as an aerospace engineer at Boeing, St. Louis.
The article, entitled “An Experimental Investigation on a Bio-Inspired Corrugated Airfoil” (AIAA Paper No. 2009-1087), was presented at 47th AIAA Aerospace Sciences Meeting and Aerospace Exposition on 5 – 8 Jan 2009 at Orlando, Florida. The paper presents a comprehensive study to quantify the aerodynamic characteristics of a bio-inspired corrugated airfoil compared with a streamlined airfoil and a flat plate at low Reynolds numbers in order to leverage the unique feature of corrugated wings found in dragonflies as an effective aerodynamic control method to explore the potential applications of such non-traditional, bio-inspired corrugated airfoils/wings to micro air vehicle (MAV) designs for improved aerodynamic performance as well as flight agility and versatility
American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) is the world’s largest professional society devoted to the progress of engineering and science in aviation, space, and defense. AIAA will proudly present Certificates of Merit to recognize such technical and scientific excellence. The Best Paper Award ceremony will be held during Awards Luncheon on Tuesday, 23 June 2009 during AIAA Applied Aerodynamics and Fluid Dynamics Conference at the Grand Hyatt Hotel in San Antonio, Texas.
Hu, who joined the Iowa State faculty in 2004, received a Faculty Early Career Development Award from the National Science Foundation in 2006. He holds PhD degrees of Aerospace Engineering from Beijing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, China, and Mechanical Engineering from the University of Tokyo, Japan.