Ongoing verification of concepts and components as the design work progresses can improve the chances of finding and fixing problems early, saving time and money.
The development of any aerospace platform is a long-term project fraught with complexity. The penalties for miscommunication or miscalculation often manifest as cost overruns, schedule delays, reliability problems, or potentially dangerous product failures.
One key to addressing these challenges is to verify an emerging design repeatedly, beginning as early as possible in the project. Unfortunately, the first verification point is often found late in the process, using a physical prototype.
Modern design methodologies utilize virtual prototypes to remedy this situation. A virtual prototype is a software-based model that provides a way to exercise the behavior of a design at the functional, architectural, implementation, and/or any combination of these abstraction levels.
Simulation software supports the design and integration of the virtual prototype and offers a myriad of capabilities to analyze it, providing early visibility into potential problems (that normally would not be realized until much later and at much greater expense to the project). Virtual prototypes and their supporting simulation software are becoming essential for making system-level behavior predictions.
A model-driven development (MDD) methodology utilizes virtual prototypes and simulation software. This approach provides a structure for managing complexity while, at each design stage, making it possible to directly link design functionality back to a development program’s original requirements and functional specifications.
A virtual prototyping infrastructure, in which models from different domains can be integrated at each stage of the development life cycle, allows system integration issues to be identified and addressed earlier in the program. Model compatibility is maintained throughout all phases of the design process, from initial concept exploration through final hardware and software verification.
Ongoing verification of concepts and components as the design work progresses can greatly improves the chances of finding and fixing problems early, saving time and money. This sort of approach reduces overall program time, cost, and risk.
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Filed Under: Aerospace + defense
