Grant: Collaborative Research and Development Grants

The worldwide aircraft industry is increasingly investing in cabin interiors research to develop newtechnologies to optimize passenger experience, so the Canadian aircraft industry must catch up. Due to themultiple customer requirements in both business and commercial aircraft, it is increasingly mandatory thataircraft interiors be available in flexible configurations. Integrators are seeking to modularize interiors, but thisonly serves to provide a partial solution. Aircraft manufacturers, such as Bombardier, are seeking to evaluateand commercialize new technologies that can help to provide increased customization, flexible manipulation,and comfort to passengers in business and commercial aircraft cabins. The objective of this research is todevelop a design/analysis method and a prototype for aircraft cabin reconfiguration based on passenger comfortincluding seating, lighting, airflow and noise. This research program is a proposed collaboration betweenRyerson, Queens, and UTIAS for a period of 2 years, consisting of three research pillars: design, analysis, andimplementation. The design pillar is to come up with a design method to maximize passenger comfort. Theanalysis pillar is to provide a simulation tool to assess passenger comfort factors to guide cabin interiorreconfiguration. The implementation pillar is to create a prototype for reconfiguration implementation toachieve passenger comfort enhancement. A number of key technologies including variable interior structure(VIS) and adaptive panel (VP), layout and topology optimization, lighting techniques, climate control, will bedeveloped and demonstrated. A number of graduate students across Ryerson, Queen's and UTIAS will betrained to become new engineers and a large number of undergraduates will be trained through industrialinternship to become new workforce in this field. Industrial interaction and collaboration through this projectwill help to create a niche for aircraft interior design and manufacturing business in Canada. This project willbe one of the focal points for the Downsview Aerospace Hub currently under development.