George H. Bryan

George Hartley Bryan (1 March 1864 – 13 October 1928), generally referred to in technical literature as G. H. Bryan, was a professor at University College, Bangor, Wales who is generally credited with developing, in 1911, the modern mathematical theory of the motion of an airplane in flight, as a rigid body with six degrees of freedom. Except for minor differences in notation form, Bryan's 1911 equations are the same as those used today to evaluate modern advanced aircraft. Surprisingly, his equations - published just eight years after the first aircraft flew - are most accurate when applied to supersonic jets. In evaluating the aircraft mathematically, Bryan focused on issues of aerodynamic stability, rather than on control aspects; stability and control of an aircraft tend to be opposite ends of the same spectrum.

Aviation wasn't Bryan's only contribution to modern science, however. His aeronautical studies were an extension of fluid dynamics engineering that he'd been studying for years. In 1888, he developed the mathematical models for pressures of a fluid in a pipe, as well as external buckling pressures. This math is still used today.

In 1890, he is also discovered so-called "wave inertia effect" in axi-symmetric thin elastic shells. This effect is the theoretical basis for modern Solid-State Gyroscopy using Wine-Glass Resonators developed by Dr. David D. Lynch, at al almost a century after this Bryan study. Such novel precise sensors for long-term satellite missions and other applications are developing now in USA, Ukraine, RF, France, South Africa, and PRC. His studies of Coriolis effects in massive liquid spheres for Seismology have been found an experimental check thanks to post-WW2 establishment of a world-wide network of seismological stations to detect nuclear explosions, and after the strong earthquake in Chile (1960).

Bibliography

Bryan G.H. The Waves on a Rotating Liquid Spheroid of Finite Ellipticity //Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London. A, Vol. 180, (1889) Online version.
Stability in Aviation (1911).
Bryan G.H. On the Beats in the Vibrations of a Revolving Cylinder or Bell //Proc. of Cambridge Phil. Soc. 1890, Nov. 24. Vol.VII. Pt.III. P.101-111.
Bryan G.H. Stability in Aviation. - Macmillan. 1911. Online Version (This is the original book scanned by Google Books).

Love A.E.H. GEORGE HARTLEY BRYAN //Journal of the London Mathematical Society. 1929. P.1-4(3). – P.238-240.

References

Abzug, Malcolm J. and Larrabee, E. Eugene, Airplane Stability and Control, Second Edition: A History of Technologies that Made Aviation Possible, Cambridge University Press, 2002. Online version.
Hunsaker, Jerome C. Dynamic Stability of Aeroplanes, US Navy and Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1916 Online version (This text validates experimentally Bryan's mathematical theories).
Lynch D.D. HRG Development at Delco, Litton, and Northrop Grumman //Proceedings of Anniversary Workshop on Solid-State Gyroscopy (19–21 May 2008. Yalta, Ukraine). - Kyiv-Kharkiv. ATS of Ukraine. 2009. ISBN 978-976-02-5248-6.
Sarapuloff S.A. 15 Years of Solid-State Gyrodynamics Development in the USSR and Ukraine: Results and Perspectives of Applied Theory //Proc. of the National Technical Meeting of Institute of Navigation (Santa Monica, Calif., USA. January 14–16, 1997). – P.151-164.