In this research, two inflatable-winged Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) in distinct configurations, a single-fuselage layout with external trailing-edge control surfaces and a twin-fuselage layout with fully movable control surfaces were designed, developed, and flight tested to investigate the flight characteristics of inflatable-winged aircraft. Initially, inflatable wings were designed and fabricated from various materials, followed by rigorous ground testing, including structural characteristics tests, pressure retention and resistance tests, and low-speed wind-tunnel evaluations. Following this, two methods for controlling the inflatable wings were proposed, and their roll control effectiveness was thoroughly investigated. Subsequently, two inflatable-winged UAV prototypes, each employing a different configuration and manipulation method, were designed, assembled, and subjected to basic low-altitude flight tests to assess the feasibility of their aerodynamic layouts and control characteristics. The results demonstrated that a segmented wing design with a multi-boom configuration is particularly well-suited for inflatable wings. Additionally, both proposed control methods were tested and shown to be effective in flight. The findings provide valuable insights into the properties of inflatable wings and offer substantial guidance for the development of inflatable-winged aircraft.

Polyphenylene sulfide (PPS) is a high-performance thermoplastic engineering material known for its excellent chemical resistance, thermal stability, and flame retardancy. In this work, the interfacial mechanical behavior of short-cut Kevlar fiber-reinforced PPS composites was systematically investigated by all-atom molecular dynamics (MD) simulations. By constructing a full-atom interface model between an amorphous PPS matrix and a Kevlar crystal, interfacial normal tension and tangential shear simulations were performed to reveal the mechanisms of load transfer, damage initiation, and damage evolution at the molecular scale. The results show that the interfacial normal tensile strength (approximately 245 MPa) is lower than the bulk tensile strength of pure PPS (approximately 270 MPa), which is attributed to the stiffness mismatch at the interface induced by the high modulus of Kevlar fibers, promoting the preferential initiation and propagation of voids near the geometrical interface. The tangential shear process exhibits pronounced stick-slip characteristics, with the interfacial binding energy fluctuating periodically with shear displacement, corresponding to the alternating establishment and rupture of non-bonded interactions between molecular chains. This study provides a theoretical basis for the micromechanical design of high-performance thermoplastic composite interfaces and identifies molecular-level optimization directions for future interfacial modification strategies of Kevlar/PPS systems.

The lightweight design of modern aircraft necessitates efficient optimization of complex thin-walled structures to improve performance and minimize mass. This paper proposes an Elastic Boundary Sub-model Optimization (EBSO) algorithm for accurately predicting and optimizing local buckling behavior in aerospace thin-walled structures. The method partitions the global structure into substructures and incorporates elastic boundary conditions to realistically simulate interaction effects between adjacent components. By establishing a direct mapping between substructural design parameters and critical buckling loads, an iterative optimization framework is developed to enable concurrent design of multiple thin-walled segments. A numerical case study involving an aircraft fuselage panel demonstrates that the EBSO algorithm significantly improves the accuracy of local buckling predictions. The results confirm that the method achieves a substantial weight reduction while maintaining structural stability, greatly enhancing the efficiency of lightweight design optimization.