Research at Embry‑Riddle Aeronautical University will help design the aerodynamics of a rotorcraft that will land on Titan, Saturn’s largest moon, as part of NASA’s Dragonfly mission to explore Titan’s “prebiotic” chemistry and habitability.

The research is supported by a NASA New Frontiers program contract of $475,000 granted to Dr. Michael Kinzel, associate professor in Embry‑Riddle’s .

The involves a rotorcraft lander with instrumentation “that primarily aims to measure aspects of Titan that will improve our understanding of early life on Earth,” Kinzel said.

Kinzel said his team of researchers was “the first group to bring high-fidelity computational models of fluids to the mission,” using high-performance computing to run hundreds to thousands of computer simulations in order to characterize the aerodynamics of Dragonfly’s operation.

The Dragonfly lander earned its name because its rotor-propelled design will allow it to flit to and land in different locations on Titan.

Titan is being explored because images of the moon provided by the Cassini orbiter have shown it has a dense atmosphere and methane clouds, rain that flows into lakes, and seas and substantial organic material on its surface. These features are considered “ingredients for life,” so studying Titan provides insight into the necessary conditions for life to exist, as well as into the processes that occurred before life developed on Earth.

Graduate research assistant and Ph.D. student Jackson Asiatico said that their “work is trying to properly characterize the aerodynamics of a vehicle that has an unfamiliar shape in an unfamiliar environment so that it can perform its science operations.” 

Kinzel and his team are currently employing NASA wind tunnel data to quantify model accuracy for the rotorcraft’s fuselage, understand sensor design and help facilitate novel measurements on Titan.

Stretches of Titan are covered in huge sand dunes up to two kilometers wide, hundreds of kilometers long and 100 meters high. The Embry‑Riddle team is also studying the interactions of the lander with dust and providing calculations of dust and particulate matter as it is kicked up by the rotorcraft “to help reduce erosion on critical sensors,” said Asiatico.

Additionally, Kinzel said, “This rotorcraft is intended to measure as much of Titan as it can. So, there are also opportunities to utilize how rotors kick up dust to measure key characteristics of the dunes. Understanding the sand character enables scientists to infer the prevailing winds that form the sand dunes.” Such a measure helps researchers to understand the overall atmosphere on Titan.

“Dr. Kinzel and his team of students are performing ground-breaking research to understand the complex aerodynamics of the Dragonfly vehicle, including interactions with the soil and regolith, which will lead to improved measurements and analysis of the Titan soil,” said Dr. Richard Prazenica, professor and interim chair of the Aerospace Engineering department. “Dr. Kinzel's selection for this project is a testament to his exceptional research capabilities and an example of the outstanding research taking place in the Embry‑Riddle Aerospace Engineering Department.”

The design of the Dragonfly rotorcraft is led by Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory, with collaboration from the Embry‑Riddle team, along with Penn State and Sikorsky, a Lockheed Martin company.

Kinzel joined Embry‑Riddle in August 2024 after having worked on the Dragonfly project since 2018.

“What drew me to Embry‑Riddle is its strong focus on overall aerospace engineering and the people — as the environment appears to breed collaboration,” Kinzel said.

Asiatico, who had worked on Dragonfly with Kinzel in an earlier phase of research, also joined him at Embry‑Riddle in August 2024.

“Embry‑Riddle has a lot of diverse faculty and plenty of collaboration opportunities, so I decided to follow Dr. Kinzel,” said Asiatico. “It seemed like the best choice for me.”