Advanced Aerospace Structures: Materials, Mechanics, and Intelligent Design
A special issue of Aerospace (ISSN 2226-4310).
Deadline for manuscript submissions: 30 August 2026 | Viewed by 488
Editors
Interests: aircraft structural design; composite structural design and analysis; smart material structural design; composite structural health diagnosis research work
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Interests: aircraft structural design; composite structural design and analysis
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
Advanced aerospace structures are central to the performance, safety, and affordability of contemporary flight systems, including transport aircraft, rotorcraft, reusable launch vehicles, reentry platforms, and rapidly emerging unmanned and high altitude vehicles. As operating envelopes expand toward harsher thermal loads, larger maneuver and gust environments, longer service lives, and stricter requirements on energy efficiency and sustainability, structural concepts must achieve a demanding balance of lightweight efficiency, damage tolerance, multi-functionality, and manufacturability.
Progress in high-performance alloys, polymer and ceramic matrix composites, hybrid laminates, architected lattices, and multifunctional coatings is enabling finely tailored combinations of stiffness, strength, thermal stability, and environmental resistance. However, material development must be coupled with deeper insight into mechanisms across scales, including multi-axial fatigue and fracture, impact and crash-worthiness, thermo-mechanical coupling, vibration and aeroelastic phenomena, and the reliability of interfaces and joints under stochastic service loading.
At the same time, intelligent design strategies are reshaping how aerospace structures are conceived, validated, and operated. Data-driven and physics-guided models, machine learning enhanced optimization, topology and lattice design, and digital twin technologies accelerate exploration of vast design spaces while supporting decision-making for certification and life-cycle management. When integrated with advanced manufacturing such as additive manufacturing and automated fiber placement, these approaches strengthen the links between process, structure, properties, and performance.
This Special Issue on Advanced Aerospace Structures: Materials, Mechanics, and Intelligent Design invites high-quality contributions that advance fundamental understanding, computational and experimental methods, and engineering applications for next-generation aerospace structural systems. Contributions covering review articles are also welcome.
Finally, I would like to thank Ben Jia for his valuable work in assisting me with this Special Issue.
Dr. Heyuan Huang
Top 2% of Scientists Worldwide (2025)
“Aoxiang Rising Star” of Northwestern Polytechnical University (2023)
Shaanxi Association for Science and Technology Youth Talent Support Program (2019)
Dr. Heyuan Huang
Prof. Dr. Meiying Zhao
Guest Editors
Manuscript Submission Information
Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.
Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-anonymized peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Aerospace is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.
Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.
Keywords
- aerospace structures
- advanced structural materials
- structural mechanics
- lightweight design and optimization
- composite and hybrid aerospace structures
- multiscale characterization and modeling
- aeroelasticity and structural dynamics
- additive manufacturing for aerospace structures
- digital twin and intelligent structural design
- structural health monitoring and reliability
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