Morphing aeronautical structures: A review focused on UAVs and durability assessment

Abstract

A concise survey of wing morphing concepts in aeronautics is presented. These morphing concepts find limited applications in traditional aircraft because of the numerous design requirements and constraints. With the rise of UAVs, new morphing designs aiming to improve their efficiency have been exploited with greater freedom. Nevertheless, several requirements should be validated in order to guarantee structural integrity. In this communication, durability problems related to fatigue loading are mentioned, and an example of fatigue analysis of a UAV is briefly discussed.