Professor of the practice Robert Liebeck, leading expert on aircraft design, dies at 87

Robert Liebeck, a teacher of the method in the MIT Division of Aeronautics and Astronautics and among the globe’s leading professionals on airplane layout, the rules of aerodynamics, and hydrodynamics, passed away on Jan. 12 at age 87.

” Bob was a coach and bosom friend to many professors, graduates, and scientists at AeroAstro throughout 25 years,” states Julie Shah, division head and the H.N. Slater Teacher of Aeronautics and Astronautics at MIT. “He’ll be deeply missed out on by all that were privileged adequate to understand him.”

Liebeck’s lengthy and notable job in aerospace design consisted of a variety of fundamental payments to the rules of aerodynamics and airplane layout, starting with his graduate study right into high-lift airfoils. His unique layouts became referred to as “Liebeck airfoils” and are made use of mainly for high-altitude reconnaissance aircrafts; Liebeck airfoils have actually additionally been adjusted for usage in Solution One auto racing cars and trucks, competing sailing boats, and also a flying reproduction of a huge pterosaur.

He was probably best understood for his cutting-edge deal with blended wing body (BWB) airplane. He managed the BWB job at Boeing throughout his popular five-decade period at the business, functioning very closely with NASA on the X-48 speculative airplane. After retiring as elderly technological other at Boeing in 2020, Liebeck continued to be energetic in BWB study. He acted as technological consultant at BWB start-up JetZero, which is intending to construct a much more fuel-efficient airplane for both armed forces and industrial usage and has actually established a time frame of 2027 for its presentation trip.

Liebeck was designated a teacher of the method at MIT in 2000, and educated courses on airplane layout and the rules of aerodynamics.

” Bob added to the division both in airplane capstones and additionally in suggesting trainees and mentoring professors, including myself,” states John Hansman, the T. Wilson Teacher of Aeronautics and Astronautics. “Along with aeronautics, Bob was really considerable in automobile racing and created the downforce wing and flap system which has actually ended up being typical on F1, IndyCar, and NASCAR cars and trucks.”

He was a significant factor to the Silent Aircraft Project, a partnership in between MIT and Cambridge College led by Dame Ann Dowling. Liebeck additionally functioned very closely with Teacher Woody Hoburg ’08 and his study team, suggesting on trainees’ study right into effective techniques for making aerospace lorries. Prior to Hoburg was approved right into the NASA astronaut corps in 2017, the team created an open-source Python bundle, GPkit, for geometric programs, which was made use of to make a five-day endurance unmanned airborne car for the united state Flying Force.

” Bob was globally valued in aeronautics and he was a friend to the division,” bears in mind Teacher Ed Greitzer.

Liebeck was an AIAA honorary other and Boeing elderly technological other, along with a participant of the National Academy of Design, Royal Aeronautical Culture, and Academy of Version Aeronautics. He was a recipient of the Guggenheim Medal and ASME Spirit of St. Louis Medal, amongst several various other honors, and was sworn in right into the International Air and Room Hall of Popularity.

A serious jogger and motorcyclist, Liebeck is born in mind by close friends and coworkers for his daring nature and kindness of spirit. Throughout an occupation stressed by honors and accomplishments, Liebeck discovered his biggest fulfillment in mentor. Along with his function at MIT, he was a complement professor at College of The Golden State at Irving and acted as professor for that college’s Design/Build/Fly and Human-Powered Plane groups.

” It is the one work where I feel I have actually done some excellent– also after a poor lecture,” he told AeroAstro Magazine in 2007. “I have actually chosen that I am lastly starting to recognize aerial design, and I intend to share that understanding with our young people.”