I am developing a new innovative landing system for airplanes and drones that locks an aircraft equipped with cooled superconductors into a strong magnetic field and allows for controlled movement along a magnetic track.

Despite the incredible amount of automated flight capability in both manned and unmanned aircraft, human oversight is still required, especially during the landing process. This project focuses on the development of a new reliable landing and take-off system for aircraft and unmanned aerial vehicles (drones) using flux pinning. Quantum locking is the application of flux pinning to create a stable form of levitation which pins a superconductor within a strong magnetic field allowing movement only along regions of constant flux. The advantages of integrating quantum locking into the development of new landing and take-off systems for aircraft have yet to be fully explored.

This research project focused on studying the kinetics of a quantum locked superconductor as it travels through a non-uniform magnetic field. A magnetic track consisting of a series of neodymium magnets with different gap sizes was constructed to generate a varying magnetic field along the motion of the superconductor. Changes to the superconductor motion were captured using a high speed camera for later analysis.

It was found that a quantum locked superconductor exposed to stronger magnetic fields was able to hold more weight and that the relationship was linear. Furthermore, a superconductor with a larger area could also hold more weight by affecting the slope of this linear relationship. Next, a t-test was used to analyze whether the differences between the push, pull, and shear forces were significantly different. Unexpectedly, there was no significant difference in the amount of weight held for each of these forces. Lastly, quantum locking was implemented into a revolute, a prismatic, and a spherical joint.

Lastly, a prototype test track was constructed to test the capture and slowing of incoming aircraft. Superconductors were attached to a Styrofoam glider plane which successfully landed on the magnetic track. Furthermore, the test track was rocked from side to side to simulate conditions on an aircraft carrier and was still able to safely capture the incoming plane.

Visit www. quantum-locking.com for more information.