CAREER: Reconfigurable Infrastructure and Scalable Execution for Advanced Air Mobility (RISE-AAM)

这一学院早期职业发展(CARAPE)项目将促进为新出现的先进空中机动任务开发变革性基础设施和执行计划所需的知识。先进的航空机动性以满足未来的交通需求和促进安全、高效和可持续的运输系统为目标，侧重于从传统的航空运输过渡到城市地区及其周围的未来客运或货运服务。然而，将空中机动性整合到复杂的三维建筑环境中，在基础设施设计和运营方面提出了许多独特的挑战。为了应对这些挑战，该项目将开发和测试一种新的航道系统以及耦合的操作规则和控制方案。根据实时出行需求、垂直港口分布和吞吐量、空域容量和环境足迹，这些方法是自适应和可扩展的。由此产生的进步预计将影响包括交通、航空航天、智慧城市和土木工程在内的多个领域。研究活动与教育活动紧密结合在一起，1)通过K-12教师培训和暑期大学预科项目支持大学前教育和研究；2)通过创建新课程、改进现有课程和指导学生研究人员来促进本科和研究生教育和研究；3)通过学术论坛、大学活动和网络平台教育更广泛的社区和普通公众。该项目的长期目标是通过提高城市地区和周边地区智能、自动化、协作航空运输服务的新概念、基础设施和运营的知识和能力来改变交通系统。该项目的总体目标是开发和测试先进的空中机动性基础设施(包括物理和数字)和执行程序，以便能够安全和有效地协调越来越多的不同类型的空中车辆，以便在混乱、动态的环境中按需提供快速运输服务。具体研究目标包括：1)优化物理空中机动性基础设施的位置，研究一种变革性的数字空中机动性基础设施；2)开发一种新的数据驱动调度方法和新的基于分布式模型的车辆控制技术的分层执行方法，以实现安全高效的空中机动性操作；3)通过集成仿真和仿真实验来验证基础设施设计和执行方法。这些贡献意义重大，因为它们是重塑交通系统的根本一步，揭示了如何在有限的空域安全高效地协调高节奏、高密度的空中交通行动。这一奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) project will advance the knowledge needed to develop transformative infrastructure and execution schemes for the emerging advanced air mobility missions. With the goals of addressing future mobility needs and fostering safe, efficient, and sustainable transportation systems, advanced air mobility focuses on the transition from the traditional air transportation to future passenger or cargo-carrying services in and around urban areas. However, integration of air mobility into complex three-dimensional built environments presents many unique challenges in infrastructure design and operation. To address these challenges, this project will develop and test a novel airway system as well as the coupled operational rules and control schemes. These approaches are adaptive and scalable depending on the real-time travel demand, vertiport distribution and throughput, airspace capacity, and environmental footprint. The resulting advances are expected to impact multiple fields including transportation, aerospace, smart cities, and civil engineering. The research activities are closely integrated with educational activities to 1) support pre-college education and research through K-12 teacher training and summer pre-college programs, 2) promote undergraduate and graduate education and research by creating new courses, enhancing existing courses, and mentoring student researchers, and 3) educate broader community and general public through scholarly forums, university events, and network platforms.The long-term goal of this project is to transform the transportation system by advancing the knowledge and capabilities of novel concepts, infrastructures, and operations for intelligent, automated, cooperative air transportation services in and around urban areas. The overall objective of this project is to develop and test advanced air mobility infrastructures (both physical and digital) and execution procedures to enable safe and efficient coordination of an increasing number of heterogeneous air vehicles for on-demand fast transit services in chaotic, dynamic environments. Specific research objectives include: 1) optimize location of physical air mobility infrastructure and investigate a transformative digital air mobility infrastructure, 2) develop a hierarchical execution approach that integrates a novel data-driven scheduling method and a new distributed model-based vehicle control technique for safe and efficient air mobility operations, and 3) validate the infrastructure designs and execution approaches through integrated simulations and emulated experiments. These contributions are significant because they are a fundamental step toward reimagining transportation systems by uncovering how high-tempo, high-density air mobility operations can be safely and efficiently coordinated in limited airspace.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.