✈️ DARPA greenlights jet-powered shape-shifting demo plane

DARPA plans to build an experimental unmanned aircraft that can alter its shape during flight using compressed air jets to modify the swirling airflow enveloping the plane. Dubbed X-65 and set for 2025 debut, the innovative showpiece will replace traditional physical control surfaces with active flow control nozzles embedded to enable smooth morphing and adjust lift.

If the 500 effectors prove capable of regulating the plane’s diamond-shaped 30-foot wingspan to steer turns as reliably as movable flaps, the revolutionary concept could remove a level of complexity from aviation.

Join us in today’s Must Read as we explore DARPA’s genuinely radical design — a jet-powered plane that shift shapes at will.

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Called X-65, the unmanned aerial vehicle will maneuver using only pressurized air jets to manipulate the surrounding airflow and modify lift. This novel concept dubbed active flow control can smoothly regulate pitch and roll by blowing localized currents over wings and body from embedded nozzles.

Set for debut flights in summer 2025 as part of the CRANE program, success could revolutionize what aircraft controls. Intelligently constricting or increasing airflow over the X-35’s 30-foot wide elongated diamond wing aims to improve stability, turning, and responsiveness without the usual flight surfaces.

With the 20-year-old concept now ready for tangible demonstrations, DARPA is ready to launch a futuristic new class of smooth, shape-shifting vehicles.

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