The Flight Research Lab is devoted to studies of unusual aircraft configurations and novel flight control concepts. Flight experiments involving small remotely piloted aircraft are used to augment results from analytical design studies. We fly these aircraft, instrumented with computers and sensors to pursue three primary goals:

• To identify the flight characteristics of proposed full-size designs. The dynamically scaled models we use for this research also provide low-risk platforms for developing active control systems necessary to be used for the full-size aircraft.
  
  
• To develop the technologies which allow pilotless (autonomous) aircraft to perform useful work in society. Robotic airplanes can be used in a host of applications where piloted vehicles are too costly or too risky.
  
  
• To provide a demanding test environment for theoretical ideas in control system design. The nonlinear, multi-variable nature of airplane dynamics make this an ideal medium for testing new control concepts.