Sophisticated high-fidelity Computational Electromagnetics simulation tools, such as HyPerComps HDPhysics-RF software toolset, allow for performance analysis of very complex antennas on full aircraft configurations for Navy applications. Many different antenna types such as passive phased array (PESA), active electronically scanned array (AESA), hybrid beam forming phased array, and digital beam forming (DBF) array can be modeled using these advanced tools without resorting to time consuming and costly physical testing. However, the automatically generated tetrahedral meshes are not always able to ensure highest element quality. Moreover, in cases such as antenna performance analysis on full aircraft platforms, high resolution tetrahedral meshes are required, resulting in high computational burden. In these applications, hexahedral meshes, can provide better quality cells with superior performance while substantially reducing the number of elements. The objective of our proposed STTR phase-I work is to transition the latest advancements in the field of auto hex meshing to the design of a robust, user-friendly, and application-oriented tool tailored to the specific needs under this STTR solicitation. Our software will fully couple CAD models to the discretized domain required by electromagnetics solvers for simulation of antenna performance on Navy aircraft platforms.
Benefit: HyPerComp maintains strategic business relationships with Boeing, Aerojet Rocketdyne, United Technologies (UTRC), and Lockheed Martin Aeronautics, all of which have a vast core investment in CAD and related software. Further, market information will be solicited form active users of our CAD and simulation tools in Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD), and Computational ElectroMagnetics (CEM) at various DoD installations. We anticipate that innovations in surface modeling and mesh generation can channel into current research projects as well as product lines, where technology demands are high and even small improvements in performance can be effective against competition. HyPerComp is actively involved with solver development and applications in the fields of fluid mechanics, electromagnetic, heat transfer and structural dynamics. We are in the process of transitioning the routine usage of very high order accurate solvers in electromagnetics and fluid dynamics to a commercial product. It is natural for a first product released under this effort to address the CAD to mesh process in the fields of structural analysis, electromagnetics and fluid mechanics, including surface as well as volume meshing. The electromagnetics, structural analysis, fluid mechanics and heat transfer market (as per the BCC Research report of March 2016), is expected to have a CAGR (compound annual growth rate) of 13.6%, with many new potential applications emerging. The US $1Bn mark is thought to have been crossed for the CFD market somewhere in 2012. We expect that revenue associated with concerns in mesh generation and interoperability will form greater than 50% of this market share, due to the relative maturity of the solvers themselves. It seems fair to expect that the scope of our proposed effort as applied to structural analysis, electromagnetics, fluids and heat transfer modeling will address a net market worth of $500 M to $800M. A more detailed study will be conducted as part of phase-I investigations. HyPerComp has initiated partnership arrangements in commercializing its products for a myriad of physics-based applications. In working with many industrial partners, HyPerComp has already generated over $10M in commercial sales since 2010 using technologies developed under various DoD SBIR Phase II contracts.
Keywords: Computational Electromagnetics, Computational Electromagnetics, Antenna array, Antennas, Modeling and Simulation, Radome, Hexahedral Mesh
