How does an airplane fly?

Abstract

Raising European Students Awareness in Aeronautical Research Through School-Labs’ is the main objective of the project REStARTS. The objective of the project is to contribute in reversing the current trend of disinterest of young people towards aeronautics. In this project,the partners of the aeronautical research and training institutes develop informative material about current research topics in aeronautics including basic aerodynamic fundamentals like ‘How does an airplane fly?’ or special challenges the aeronautical research is facing like ‘How greening air transport?’ or ‘How to ensure satisfaction, safety and security of the passengers?’ . This demonstrates the direct link between research and society. The scientists work in cooperation with a pedagogic team and teachers of local schools to compile understandable teaching material, which also includes simple experiments to demonstrate the physical phenomena being investigated. The school lessons based on this material give a first impression of the challenges of the modern aeronautical research. The school-labs established at the research institutes provide more sophisticated experiments and enable school classes to get a hands-on experience inscientific work. Additional visits of the laboratories of the project partners and their industrial partners complete the program. This will build bridges between school theory and applied research by delivering an insight to the work of research organisations. The ambition is to stimulate young people’s interests in a R&D career in aeronautics and to create a European network of Aeronautical School-Labs.