Elementary Flight Dynamics with an Introduction to Bifurcation and Continuation Methods

Dr. Nandan K Sinha is on the faculty of the Department of Aerospace Engineering at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Madras, India, where he is currently serving as professor since July 2014. Dr. Sinha has Bachelors, Masters, and PhD degrees in Aerospace Engineering, all from IITs. Post-PhD, he worked as a visiting scholar in the applied dynamics group at the TU-Darmstadt, Germany for three years, before joining IIT Madras in 2006. Dr. Sinha has over one and half decade experience of teaching courses in flight mechanics, vibrations, controls, and nonlinear dynamics. His research interests evolve around design, dynamics, control and guidance of aerospace vehicles working on several funded projects from various agencies. He is known for his popular video lecture series on Flight Dynamics available on youtube and web-based lecture series on Introduction to Space Technology, both via NPTEL resources, an initiative of MHRD, Govt of India. He has co-authored books "Elementary Flight Dynamics with an Introduction to Bifurcation and Continuation Methods" and "Advanced Flight Dynamics with Elements of Flight Control" with Dr. N Ananthkrishnan both published by CRC press, USA in 2014 and 2017, respectively. In recognition of his contribution to the field of aerospace engineering, Dr. Sinha was nominated to and has been a participant of the International Visitors Leadership Program (IVLP) organized by the Department of State, USA in the year 2018. Dr. Sinha is a senior member of the AIAA and has served as reviewer and associate editor for many reputed journals and conferences. Dr N Ananthkrishnan is an Independent Consultant presently based out of Mumbai (India) with over twenty-five years’ experience in academia and industry in multi-disciplinary research and development across a wide spectrum from Combustion Systems to Airplane Aerodynamics to Flight Control & Guidance. Over the past decade and a half, he has largely worked with businesses in the Mumbai/Pune area and Bangalore in India, and in Daejeon (South Korea), and with a few select academic institutes. His recent work has focused on the broad area of Aerospace Systems Design & Integration with emphasis on Atmospheric Flight Mechanics & Control and Air-breathing Propulsion Systems. He has previously served on the faculty of Aerospace Engineering at the Indian Institute of Technology, IIT Bombay at Mumbai (India) and as a Visiting Faculty Member at the California Institute of Technology at Pasadena, CA (USA) and at KAIST (South Korea). He received the “Excellence in Teaching” award at IIT Bombay in the year 2000. He has authored two books (with NK Sinha), Elementary Flight Dynamics with an Introduction to Bifurcation and Continuation Methods (2014), and Advanced Flight Dynamics with Elements of Flight Control (2017), both published by CRC Press, Taylor & Francis, USA. He received his education in Aerospace Engineering at the Indian Institutes of Technology majoring in Flight Mechanics & Control, Aerodynamics, Aircraft Design, and Nonlinear Systems. He is Associate Fellow, American Institute of Aeronautics & Astronautics (AIAA) and has served a term as a member of the AIAA Atmospheric Flight Mechanics Technical Committee.

1. Introduction 2. Stability Concept 3. Longitudinal Trim and Stability 4. Longitudinal Control 5. Long-Period (Phugoid) Dynamics 6. Lateral-Directional Motion 7. Lateral-Directional Dynamic Modes 8. Computational Flight Dynamics 9. Appendix: Case Studies