Iain Boyd News

Professor Iain Boyd discusses the development of new hypersonic defense systems in a new column at Defense News: A recent article in The New York Times strongly implied that hypersonic weapons under development at the U.S. Department of Defense are being overhyped. In particular, several points made in a recent...

Iain Boyd has an unusual specialty: He studies the insanely fast. The aerospace engineer specializes in hypersonic flight—or when vehicles hit speeds of roughly 4,000 miles per hour or more, the kind of conditions that spacecraft face when they’re plunging through the atmospheres of Earth or even Mars. At those...

No single scientist or engineer, no matter how smart, could solve the challenges of controlled, maneuverable flight of an aircraft or returning spacecraft traveling at more than five times the speed of sound. Temperatures on the vehicles can soar past 2,000 degrees Celsius, and conventional control designs won’t work. “It...

Professor Iain Boyd discusses the potential for nuclear-powered rockets in a new column at The Conversation: With dreams of Mars on the minds of both NASA and Elon Musk, long-distance crewed missions through space are coming. But you might be surprised to learn that modern rockets don’t go all that...

Professor Iain Boyd is hoping new materials research funding from the U.S. Navy will lead to better understanding and management of heat transfer in hypersonic vehicles through the use of ultra-high-temperature ceramics. Boyd, who is based in the Ann and H.J. Smead Department of Aerospace Engineering Sciences, said the research...

The US Department of Defense is leading a new charge, pouring more than $1 billion annually into hypersonic research. Competition from ambitious programs in China and Russia is a key motivator. Although hype and secrecy muddy the picture, all three nations appear to have made substantial progress in overcoming...

Iain Boyd is thinking fast. Extremely fast. So fast that breaking the sound barrier is practically standing still. Welcome to the world of hypersonics, where the minimum speed is it least 3,836 mph, or five times the speed of sound. Boyd's work focuses on the physics problems of hypersonic flight...

The Ann and H.J. Smead Department of Aerospace Engineering Sciences is welcoming four new faculty members. Meet the team and see why we're so excited about these talented new hires: