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

这个教师早期职业发展（Career）项目将推进为新兴的先进空中机动任务开发变革性基础设施和执行方案所需的知识。为了解决未来的交通需求，促进安全、高效和可持续的交通系统，先进的空中交通侧重于从传统的航空运输向未来城市及其周边地区的客运或货运服务的过渡。然而，将空中交通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型气道系统，以及耦合的操作规则和控制方案。这些方法可根据实时旅行需求、垂直飞行分布和吞吐量、空域容量和环境足迹进行自适应和扩展。由此产生的进步预计将影响多个领域，包括交通、航空航天、智能城市和土木工程。研究活动与教育活动紧密结合：1)通过K-12教师培训和暑期大学预科课程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公众。该项目的长期目标是通过提升新概念、基础设施和运营的知识和能力，实现城市及其周边地区的智能、自动化、协作式航空运输服务，从而改变交通系统。该项目的总体目标是开发和测试先进的空中机动基础设施（包括物理和数字）和执行程序，以便在混乱、动态的环境中安全有效地协调越来越多的异质飞行器，以实现按需快速运输服务。具体研究目标包括：1)优化物理空中交通基础设施的位置，并研究变革性数字空中交通基础设施；2)开发一种分层执行方法，该方法集成了一种新的数据驱动调度方法和一种新的基于分布式模型的车辆控制技术，以实现安全高效的空中交通运营；3)通过集成仿真和仿真实验验证基础设施设计和执行方法。这些贡献意义重大，因为它们是重塑运输系统的重要一步，揭示了如何在有限的空域内安全高效地协调高节奏、高密度的空中机动操作。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值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.