USQ-led team awarded $1 m grant for hypersonic flight test project

A flight testing program for hypersonic vehicles led by the University of Southern Queensland was awarded a $1,009,570 ARC Linkage Projects grant this week.

USQ said in a statement on Friday that the project would see the team design “a suite of new instruments suiting various platforms (airborne, ground-based and high-altitude drones) for observing high-speed flight tests” in research on launch-to-space and return-from-space technologies.

The team also includes members from University of Queensland, University of Stuttgart, Rocket Technologies International, the German Aerospace Center, Southern Launch and Hypersonix Launch Systems.

The collaborative project – which is set to run for five years – will also fine-tune computational simulations of the flight tests “and develop new ways to deduce the aerodynamic and thermal conditions experienced during high-speed flight.”

“Aerospace flight testing is essential for assessing the reliability of space-access technologies including re-useable rockets and hypersonic air-breathing systems,” said research lead Professor David Buttsworth (pictured on right) from USQ’s Institute for Advanced Engineering and Space Sciences

“These tests give us vital optical data in video and scientific formats, and we’re looking at ways to gain even more insight from these flights.”

Picture: supplied

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