Advances in Novel Materials for Aerospace Engineering

Dear Colleagues,

In recent years, much progress has been made on the development of aerospace materials for structural applications. Alloys, such as Al-based alloys, have been developed for the aerospace industry with outstanding advantages. Composite materials have thus started to take on more and more important roles in aircrafts; however, these still face some major issues, such as delamination. Functionally graded materials (FGMs) have been conceived to overcome this limitation. In space applications, high operating temperatures are imposed to couple materials with very different properties; FGMs are characterized by a functional variation in the composition of the material properties along the thickness that reduce the interlaminar discontinuities which are the main cause of delamination.

On the other hand, smart materials are gaining importance continuously in the aerospace industry because of their unique features, such as self-sensing, self-adaptability, memory capabilities, and manifold functions. Finally, a new research field has emerged in the last decade to study metamaterials. These are made from assemblies of multiple elements, and their properties are beyond those of their constituent materials. Several types of metamaterials can be found; among these, acoustic metamaterials are attracting aerospace researchers for the developement of lightweight acoustic insulation treatments.

Classical models cannot be clearly employed in the analysis of all these materials. In most cases, researchers have to resort to classical finite element models based on very fine 3D meshes encountering the following main drawbacks: high computational cost, limited multifield capabilities, and difficulty in coupling the micro- and macroscales in aerospace simulations. Accurate and efficient mathematical models have yet to be implemented.

This Special Issue focuses on the following topics: (1) recent advances in the development of aerospace materials, (2) challenges faced by recent aerospace materials, and (3) advances in modelling of innovative aerospace materials.

Prof. Dr. Maria Cinefra
Guest Editor

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• alloys
• lightweight materials
• functionally graded materials
• composite
• smart materials (self-sensing, self-adaptability, memory capabilities, and manifold functions)
• metamaterials
• acoustic
• finite element models