Metamaterials, man-made composites that are scaled smaller than the wavelength, have demonstrated a huge potential for application in acoustics, allowing the production of sub-wavelength acoustic absorbers, acoustic invisibility, perfect acoustic mirrors and acoustic lenses for hyper focusing, and acoustic illusions and enabling new degrees of freedom in the control of the acoustic field. The zero, or even negative, refractive sound index of metamaterials offers possibilities for the control of acoustic patterns and sound at sub-wavelength scales. Despite the tremendous growth in research on acoustic metamaterials during the last decade, the potential of metamaterial-based technologies in aeronautics has still not been fully explored, and its utilization is still in its infancy. Thus, the principal concepts mentioned above could very well provide a means to develop devices that allow the mitigation of the impact of civil aviation noise on the community. This paper gives a review of the most relevant works on acoustic metamaterials, analyzing them for their potential applicability in aeronautics, and, in this process, identifying possible implementation areas and interesting metabehaviors. It also identifies some technical challenges and possible future directions for research with the goal of unveiling the potential of metamaterials technology in aeronautics.

The rapidly growing use of small satellites for space missions requires deployable systems to be highly storable yet large and with adequate mechanical properties when deployed. This paper focuses on the modeling and simulation of a meter-class passively deployable boom, based on the self-contained linear meter-class deployable boom, exploiting the bistable nature of composite shells. Experimental tests were performed on a boom prototype suspended in a gravity offloading system. The strain energy level, deployment time, and spacecraft displacements calculated from the finite element method agree well with analytical analyses, confirming the theoretical accuracy of the finite element method. Because friction and strain energy relaxation were not included in the model, the finite element simulations predicted deployment times up to five times shorter than those of the gravity offloaded boom experiments. The quick deployment and violent end-of-deployment shock created boom deployment dynamics that were not seen in the experiments. The observed differences between the finite element model and the tests were mainly due to inaccurate material and friction models.

Bistable tape springs are suitable as deployable structures thanks to their high packaging ratio, self-deployment ability, low cost, light weight, and stiffness. A deployable booms assembly composed of four 1-m long bistable glass fiber tape springs was designed for the electromagnetically clean 3U CubeSat Small Explorer for Advanced Missions (SEAM). The aim of the present study was to investigate the deployment dynamics and reliability of the SEAM boom design after long-term stowage using onground experiments and simulations. A gravity offloading system (GOLS) was built and used for the onground deployment experiments. Two booms assemblies were produced and tested: a prototype and an engineering qualification model (EQM). The prototype assembly was deployed in a GOLS with small height, whereas the EQM was deployed in a GOLS with tall height to minimize the effects of the GOLS. A simple analytical model was developed to predict the deployment dynamics and to assess the effects of the GOLS and the combined effects of friction, viscoelastic relaxation, and other factors that act to decrease the deployment force. Experiments and simulations of the deployment dynamics indicate significant viscoelastic energy relaxation phenomena, which depend on the coiled radius and stowage time. In combination with friction effects, these viscoelastic effects decreased the deployment speed and the end-of-deployment shock vibrations.