Aircraft

Abstract

The dream of flying is as old as mankind. History is full of stories about attempts to fly, from Icarus' waxand-feather wings, or Leonardo da Vinci and his helicopter, to Jules Verne and his Journey to the Moon. The first manned flight ever reported was that of the Montgolfier brothers in their balloon. But it was more recently, in the late 1890s, that Otto Lilienthal took a scientific approach to aerodynamics and flight mechanics. He studied the cambered wings of birds, and his Lilienthal Polar Diagram is still in use today. Shortly afterwards, the Wright brothers made their famous powered flight, ultimately based on Lilienthal's theories. © 2009 Springer Berlin Heidelberg.