Lately, due to the concentration of population in metropolitan areas, traffic congestion in the hub city has occurred, and future mobility AAM development is undergoing active progress to solve this situation. Accordingly, reducing noise pollution, which is pointed out as one of the problems of AAM, is an essential technical issue for urban operation. In this study, a duct, which is a representative aerodynamic noise reduction method, was used, and numerical analysis was performed using ANSYS FLUENT, a CFD software, according to the shape of struts in the duct. The FW-H of the transient-state LES model was used, and the steady-state analysis value was used as the initial value to save analysis time. Case 1 without strut, Case 2 with strut of an airfoil section, and Case 3 with strut of a rectangle section were designed and compared at a rotational speed of 6,000 RPM. Compared to Case 1, Case 2 and Case 3 showed improved thrust by about 7% and 2%, respectively. Compared to Case 2, Case 3 showed reduced OASPL from a minimum of 0.0793 dB to a maximum of 1.0072 dB. It was found that shapes of strut in the duct significantly affect thrust and aerodynamic noise.

Recently, as UAM has been in the spotlight worldwide, the issue of aerodynamic noise generated from propellers has emerged. Therefore, changes in thrust and aerodynamic noise were compared while changing the propeller lay-out distance. The designed propeller model was analyzed using ANSYS Fluent, a CFD software. Based on steady-state analysis, transient analysis was performed, and SPL was calculated using the FW-H noise model. Based on the standard propeller lay-out distance of 0.1 R (0.12 mm), 5 cases from 0.2 R to 0.6 R were compared with the reference model at equal intervals of 0.1 R. The thrust increased by up to 3.5% as the propeller distance increased. In most listeners positioned to measure SPL, noise was reduced by 0.07-0.7% in the improved model compared to the reference model due to reduction in local vorticity. However, because pressure fluctuation due to the increase in thrust and high SPL in the low-frequency region were measured, noise increased by 0.6% to 3.5% in some listeners. Increasing the propeller distance enhances thrust performance, but inevitably increases noise due to pressure fluctuations and SPL in the low-frequency region. Therefore, strict analysis of noise prediction according to a specific frequency and various design shapes are needed.

Urban air mobility (UAM) is rapidly growing as a new means of transportation. As a result, noise pollution is emerging as a new technical challenge. Therefore, the sawtooth-shaped biomimetic designs were incorporated on the trailing edge of the blade to reduce flow-induced noise. The biomimetic virtual design was analyzed using the CFD software, ANSYS FLUENT V20.2. Based on the steady-state RANS flow solution, the acoustic power was calculated using the broadband noise source model to evaluate acoustic radiation. Four different cases with cutting lengths of 3.1 mm, 3.7 mm, 4.3 mm, and 4.9 mm of blades were compared with the base model at the rotational blade speed of 6,000 RPM. The maximum acoustic power level of the biomimetic blades ranged from 37.24 dB to 39.88 dB, resulting in a 10% reduction compared to the original blade (42.02 dB). The novel design affected the blade area, which inevitably reduced the slight thrust performance. However, the thrust was reduced to approximately less than 5% compared with the base blade in case 1. The biomimetic blade reduced the thrust due to its aerodynamic characteristics. However, the design of a blade with an appropriate cutting length has a greater effect in reducing noise rather than thrust.

Drone stations are increasingly being applied to enhance the mission capabilities of drones. The drone’s station landing occurs in a limited space. A relative position communication signal between the drone and the station is required. Strong, precise control over communication signal interference is required. In this paper, we describe a filter processing method for position signal processing. In consideration of the anchor position and installation angle of the UWB module of the drone station, nine performance test cases were proposed. As a result of the performance test, high position accuracy output was confirmed when considering the result of minimizing signal shading and beam pattern direction with excellent reception sensitivity. A performance test was conducted using the developed drone station, and the landing performance was confirmed with a precision of within 20 cm.

In this study, a novel input signal transformer is introduced to remove an overshoot and steady-state error that hinder stable tracking and landing of an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) based on image recognition, and the performance is verified. The Input Signal Transformer (IST) is designed in the shape of a sigmoid function to attenuate or amplify the input signal to resolve the aforementioned problems. For the verification of the UAV control system based on the IST, the UAV, target, and sensors were implemented in a virtual environment using the robot operating system (ROS). And data exchange structure and control system were built by the ROS-based message communication. A simulation was performed to confirm the elimination of the overshoot and steady-state error when the UAV to which the above control system was applied tracks and lands a fixed target and a moving target. As a result of the simulation, when the IST was not used, the UAV performed an unstable because of the overshoot and could not land on the target by the steady-state error. Conversely, in the case of using IST, it was confirmed that the flight was stable and landed successfully.

The purpose of this study was to examine the effect of gender and foot landing type (forefoot vs. rearfoot landing) on kinematics, kinetics, and energy absorption of lower extremity joint. Twenty males and twenty females performed single-leg landing with two different foot landing types: forefoot landing and rearfoot landing. Three-dimensional kinematic and kinetic parameters were measured using motion capture system. Greater knee valgus angle at peak vertical ground reaction force (p = 0.034) during rearfoot landing increased the risk of anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) injury in females as increasing valgus positioning from neutral alignment could increase the load on ACL. Greater contribution of ankle joint and less contribution of hip joint in energy dissipation were found in females during both forefoot (p = 0.029 and p = 0.016, respectively) and rearfoot landing (p = 0.003 and p = 0.016, respectively). These results suggest that increasing muscular activity of ankle plantarflexor could reduce shock transmission to the proximal joint in females. In addition, greater hip joint’s contribution to total negative work in males induced lower hip flexion angle found in both forefoot and rearfoot landing by elevated activation of the hip extensor. In conclusion, landing strategy differs between genders in both forefoot and rearfoot landing.