Free-flight analysis of flapping flight during turning by fluid-structure interaction finite element analysis based on arbitrary Lagrangian-Eulerian method

An insect's flapping flight is an attractive method of transportation. It shows many useful flight modes such as maneuverable turning and stable hovering. In recent studies, experimental methods and numerical simulations have been successfully applied to solve the mechanism quantitatively. However, it is extremely difficult to accurately estimate the deformation of the wing caused by interaction with airflow. In prior studies, we analyzed this problem using a novel numerical simulation, fluid-structure interaction analysis, in order to represent this interactive behavior accurately, and achieved the quantitative evaluation of dragonfly hovering with flexible wings. As an advanced analysis, we added a solution of the interaction between the body and wings to the method, and realized free-flight simulation. Here, we demonstrate a sharp turn of 10 rad/s in a numerical simulation using a model based on an actual dragonfly.