Am. Inst. of Aero. & Astro.

Fundamentals of hybrid rocket combustion and propulsion.

Chaiverini, a propulsion engineer, and Kuo (mechanical engineering, The Pennsylvania State University) bring together respected experts in the field of hybrid rockets in this text/reference for industrial designers, propulsion steam analysts, test engineers, academic researchers, and graduate and advanced undergraduate students in chemical propulsion. Coverage encompasses fundamental aspects of hybrid combustion, theoretical and experimental approaches to solid- fuel regression rate characterization, and both analytical and numerical modeling of hybrid rocket internal flow fields. Other areas covered include transient hybrid rocket combustion, scaling effects relevant to hybrid motors, practical applications, and challenges for continued advancements in the field. B&w photos are included. (Annotation ©2007 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)

Highly flexible structures; modeling, computation, and experimentation. (CD-ROM included)

Highly flexible structures as discussed in this work by Pai (mechanical and aerospace engineering, U. of Missouri-Columbia) are nonlinearly elastic structures designed that have applications from space structural systems to home appliances. He describes the modeling and computational analysis of highly flexible structures and presents experimental techniques for measuring large static and/or dynamic deformations of highly flexible structures. His graduate-level treatment is intended to close the gap between engineers and applied mathematicians. It presents mathematically consistent and systematic derivations of geometrically exact theories for one-dimensional and two-dimensional structures, solution techniques based on the multiple shooting method for computing numerically exact solutions, fully nonlinear finite element analysis of static and dynamic deformations, and the experimental methods mentioned above. The CD-ROM contains programs for solving example problems, finite element solution sequences, function files of types of linear and nonlinear finite elements, a variety of functions, and video files showing experiments. (Annotation ©2007 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)

Hired minds; a career guide for engineering students and graduates.

This guide gives tips for starting out in a career as an entry-level engineer, with examples from the aerospace industry that can be applied to the automotive, commercial products, manufacturing, and research industries, among others. Gardner uses the experiences of about 24 engineers to illustrate getting started successfully in a job, rather than how to climb the corporate ladder. He covers resumes, interviews, the first two weeks, working on projects, dealing with managers, changing programs, continuing education, and office skills not related to engineering, such as meetings and paperwork. There is no index or bibliography. Gardner is working on graduate degrees from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in aeronautical and astronautical engineering and business administration. (Annotation ©2007 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)