Geometric description of a gliding grey-headed albatross (Thalassarche chrysostoma) for computer-aided design

Abstract

Albatrosses are increasingly drawing attention from the scientific community due to their remarkable flight capabilities. Recent studies suggest that grey-headed albatrosses (GHA) may be the fastest and most energy-efficient of the albatross species, yet no attempts have been made to replicate their wing design. A key factor in aircraft design is the airfoil, which remains uncharacterized for the GHA. Other critical aspects, such as wing twist and dihedral/anhedral, also remain unquantified for any albatross species. This study aimed to fill this gap in the current knowledge by extracting detailed morphological data from a GHA wing to recreate digitally. A well-preserved dried GHA wing was scanned in the presence of airflow in a wind tunnel, at conditions that represent a GHA in gliding flight. Wing cross-sections were extracted and smoothed to produce a series of airfoils along the wing span. The 3D properties such as wing dihedral/anhedral, sweep and twist were also extracted and used to build a CAD model of the wing. Variations in airfoil shape were observed along the wing span, with thicker, more cambered airfoils near the wing base. The model wing's camber was slightly higher, particularly in the arm section, but overall matched flight photographs. The body, tail, and bill were modelled based on available photographs and known dimensions from literature and merged with the wing to form the final bill-body-wing-tail model. This model is based on real GHA morphology under aerodynamic pressure, in gliding flight. Although geometric changes due to scanner interference remain a limitation of this method, the extracted geometric data still provide valuable insights into wing performance under varying conditions. The geometry can also be fully parameterized for complex simulations, aiding studies of GHA aerodynamics and engineering design, such as in aircraft or wind turbines at similar Reynolds numbers.