New Complexities in new Aviation: UTM, UAM, and RAM

Abstract:  When the dust settled on the 20th century, Boeing and Ford were not competitors. Aviation was 1.6% of the under 500 mile trip market and 85% of the one above 1500 miles. We discuss how 21st century aviation is making a play for the short-trip market in the form of UTM. UAM, or RAM, and in the process creating operational problems of unprecedented complexity for the national airspace system. The scales of urban mobility are radically different from those of the inter-urban mobility market served by legacy aviation. For example, the entire NAS supports about 45,000 daily flights on average. Our models show the number of drone flights will exceed twice that in the San Francisco Bay Area alone. We will discuss the aircraft and airspace coordination and control problems that flow from these radical departures from the scales of legacy aviation.

Bio: Raja Sengupta is Professor in the Systems Engineering Program, Civil & Environmental Engineering at UC Berkeley. He holds a Systems Phd from the University of Michigan. His research spans automated & connected cars, drones, smartphones, urban air mobility, public health, wireless networking, and control theory. He likes to do research with industry and get it into the marketplace. He holds car-to-road networking patents with Toyota, a UAV patent with BAE Aerospace, and has car-to-car networking contributions standardized by the SAE into J2945. He created technology for the successful start-up automatic.com and founded Responsible Robotics. He has been an advisor to the World Bank, recipient of USDOT’s Connected Vehicle Technology award, UC Berkeley’s Energy and Climate Lectures Innovation Award, and has authored over a hundred papers spanning control theory, networking, drones, and transportation.

***Event will take place in hybrid format. The location for in-person attendance will be room 1311 EECS.   Attendance will also be possible via Zoom. Zoom link and password will be distributed to the Controls Group e-mail list-serv.

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