CBL - Campus del Baix Llobregat

Projecte llegit

Títol: Enhancing BlueSky Simulation Fidelity: Implementation of Point-Mass Aircraft Dynamics and Atmospheric Modelling

Estudiants que han llegit aquest projecte:

Director/a: ERITJA OLIVELLA, ANTONI-JOSEP

Departament: FIS

Títol: Enhancing BlueSky Simulation Fidelity: Implementation of Point-Mass Aircraft Dynamics and Atmospheric Modelling

Data inici oferta: 13-01-2026     Data finalització oferta: 13-09-2026


Estudis d'assignació del projecte:
    DG ENG AERO/SIS TEL
Tipus: Individual
 
Lloc de realització: EETAC
 
Paraules clau:
Simulation, Aircraft Performance Modeling, Atmosphere Modeling
 
Descripció del contingut i pla d'activitats:
Simulation tools are essential for analysing ATM concepts without impacting real-world operations. BlueSky is an open-source air traffic simulator widely used for research and education. Its current aircraft performance and atmospheric models have limitations in terms of flexibility and realism. Enhancing these models can expand the simulator's capabilities and make simulations more reflective of real operational conditions.

In this bachelor's thesis, you will integrate additional, more accurate aircraft performance and atmosphere models into BlueSky. The goal is to provide more modelling options and enhance the simulator's overall capabilities for research, teaching, and operational studies.

By incorporating these advanced performance models, you will also have the opportunity to use the lab's optimisation engine to simulate the performance of yet-to-fly flights, enabling more precise and efficient trajectory predictions. This project provides practical experience in improving an ATM research tool while deepening your understanding of aircraft performance, trajectory modelling, and air traffic operations.
 
Overview (resum en anglès):
Air Traffic simulation is a key tool for the analysis, design, and validation of new operational concepts for Air Traffic Management (ATM). Open source simulators provide great flexibility for research. However, they often present limitations in aircraft performance and in the fidelity of atmospheric models. BlueSky, developed by Delft University of Technology, is one of the most used open source ATM simulators. Nevertheless, its precision can be compromised by the use of simplified models.
This bachelor's thesis investigates and proves BlueSky's superiority over other open source ATM simulators and improves its fidelity by performing modifications to the open source code in order to implement advanced aircraft performance and atmospheric models. In particular, BADA 4 (Base of Aircraft Data) models are integrated using the pyBADA libraries, developed and maintained by EUROCONTROL, hence, substantially increasing the simulator's capacity to represent more realistic flight dynamics. The APM BADA, previously implemented using ASCII files, is migrated to a pyBADA-based implementation. Finally, the last aircraft-performance-related modification is the development of a plugin that integrates the changes described above and, in addition, replaces the aircraft's behaviour, previously based on a kinematic model, with a force-based three-Degree-of-Freedom (3-DOF) model.
The modifications performed to BlueSky's open source code allow for a quantitative comparison between the original simulator without the advanced models and the actual modified simulator, evaluating parameters such as fuel consumption and flight profiles under given atmospheric conditions.
Even though this thesis focuses on civil air traffic simulation, the improvements developed can be extended to other sectors, such as flight planning, environmental impact, or validation of new operational concepts for Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV).

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