A NASA project designed to enhance safety in advanced air mobility (AAM) aircraft, such as air taxis and medical emergency drones, developed new layers of collaboration among NASA officials, project leaders, researchers and students from Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University and other partnering institutions at a recent meeting marking the project’s first year.

“We are entering the second year of a four-year project with strong enthusiasm and a shared commitment to advancing the project’s research and goals,” said Dr. Hever Moncayo, professor of Aerospace Engineering and principal investigator of the effort.

The overall goal of the project, which was selected for a $6.7 million NASA University Leadership Initiative grant last year, is to develop the capability of AAM aircraft to recognize unexpected events and emergencies and safely respond in real time.

The meeting brought together researchers and students from Embry-Riddle, Georgia Tech, the University of Southern California, the University of Texas at Arlington, Collins Aerospace, the Army Research Lab and Argonne National Laboratory.

Ph.D. candidate Michael Budihartono said the meeting gave him the opportunity to meet and collaborate with highly respected experts in the field.

“I was honestly a little intimidated by the opportunity to work with them,” he said. “But I quickly realized how welcoming and encouraging they are.”

Their input “challenged me to think about problems in ways I might not have considered otherwise,” he added.

Budihartono’s role in the project is developing an “intelligent health monitoring system” for AAM vehicles to “quickly and accurately detect and classify” problems in real-time operation and to limit the vehicles’ responses to such faults within a margin of safety.

Aerospace Engineering senior Natalia Bylinska said that working with expert researchers and graduate students has deepened her understanding of aircraft dynamics, control systems and simulation. The experience, she said, “has allowed me to bridge the gap between concepts learned in lectures and real-world application in aerospace research.”

Moncayo said the project participants have made great progress in integrating separate components, each with a different function, into a coordinated system to monitor aircraft operation and safety in real time. The researchers are also evaluating these components through simulations and flight testing using their experimental platforms, including a small Crazyflie drone and vertical takeoff and landing vehicles.

“This gives our students hands-on experience with system development, integration and testing, allowing them to see how their research contributes to an operational system,” Moncayo said.

Moncayo said the students’ opportunity to work with partner institutions and experts is “invaluable both for the research and for preparing students to work on complex challenges as part of a multidisciplinary team.”