Aerospace Engineering

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Aerospace engineers work full time, sometimes in office environments, sometimes at testing or launch sites. They often specialize in areas such as aerodynamic fluid flow; structural design; guidance, navigation, and control; instrumentation and communication; robotics; and propulsion and combustion. This will impact their workspace.

Because teamwork is such a big part of engineering, they will likely work on a team with other engineers from the same and other fields. The development of a rocket to carry people and experiments to space is a team effort! Engineers who direct projects must often work extra hours to monitor progress, to ensure that designs meet requirements, to determine how to measure aircraft performance, to see that production meets design standards, to participate in test flights and first flights, and to ensure that deadlines are met.

Aerospace engineers might be working on a new effort, such as developing a spacecraft that would be able to land on an asteroid, or working to improve the efficiency of an airplane to help reduce its impact on the environment. So problems and challenges may change day to day or project to project. Unlike some fields, where the type of work and challenges are similar day to day, for an engineer, the challenges are different every day, and errors or unexpected changes to a project may require people to change strategy and start again.  Flexibility is a big part of any engineering effort.

International Space Station:

The International Space Station (ISS) is a modular space station residing in low Earth orbit. It took a decade and 30+ missions to deliver and assemble. It is the result of unprecedented scientific and engineering collaboration among five participating space agencies: NASA (United States), Roscosmos (Russia), JAXA (Japan), ESA (Europe), and CSA (Canada). The station serves as research laboratory for many fields and has contributed to advances in environmental protection, medicine, and physics. A few fun facts:

• since it opened, ISS astronauts have conducted about 3,000 science experiments, so far!
• 241 individuals from 19 countries have visited the ISS.
• It has been continuously occupied since November 2000.
• It is larger than a six-bedroom house.
• Eight miles of wire connects the electrical power system aboard the space station.

Needless to say, mechanical engineers have made great progress in improving the efficiency of these machines that have allowed buildings all over the world to be able to rise further into the sky. (There is a limit to how many flights of stairs people are willing to climb!)

Explore the history:

• Twenty Breakthroughs from Twenty Years of Research on the ISS
• History and Timeline of the ISS
• ISS Facts and Figures

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Aerospace engineers typically are employed in the aerospace product and parts industry, although their skills are becoming increasingly valuable in other fields. For example, in the motor vehicles manufacturing industry, aerospace engineers design vehicles that have lower air resistance and, thus, increased fuel efficiency.

In terms of global employment, most aerospace engineers work in the areas of national defense, or related projects or the design of civilian aircraft and space vehicles. Research-and-development projects, especially related to improving the safety, fuel efficiency, and environmental impact of flight, are a large focus of aerospace engineers.

In addition to government agencies, several companies are emerging to provide access to space for consumers. These areas are likely to expand as confidence in consumer safety increases.  Plus, many companies are finding other uses for unmanned aerial vehicles, such as for finding lost hikers, identifying forest fires and helping to provide foods and medicines to populations experiencing emergencies.

Some aerospace engineers also work in the work of education, helping to support the next generation, and the expertise of aerospace engineers is needed in most industries to provide input on legal or technical matters.

The following is just a sample of some companies, outside of government, so you can explore the type of projects worked on globally:

• Airbus Group
• Beechcraft
• Boeing
• Cessna
• Dassault Aviation
• Northrop Grumman
• Piaggio
• SpaceX
• Virgin Galactic

For most engineering careers:

• a bachelor’s degree is required
• a master’s degree may be recommended for those specializing or interested in management
• students may also start with a related associate degree and then move on to a bachelor’s when they have settled on a degree path.
• many students are required to participate in a co-op program while at university to gain real world experience in their chosen field.
• education doesn’t really stop…engineers need to stay current as technology changes and materials and processes improve over time.
• many professional societies offer certificates and coursework to support continuing education for their members.

Undergraduate coursework would include aircraft and spacecraft propulsion, aircraft design, gas dynamics, solid mechanics, materials and structures, computational thinking, automatic control, aerodynamics, fluid mechanics, and others.

It is important to select an engineering degree that has been accredited to meet basic standards. Find out more and browse TryEngineering’s global database of accredited engineering and computing programs.

Aerospace engineers have had impacts on many industries all over the world.  In addition to the obvious support to travel and transportation of goods via flight, their contributions to space technology have had impacts on many fields, including manufacturing, materials development, robotics, scientific instrumentation, computing, virtual reality and 3-D printing.

Throughout its history, the space station has also served as a hub for communications research and development. From 2012 to 2019, the SCaN Testbed provided communications engineers with a platform to study space-based applications of software-defined radios. The Testbed researched innovations like cognitive communications, space-based GPS, and Ka-band communications!

As you can imagine, there are many types of engineers working together to make this new underground line a reality. You can read about several people contributing to this project here to see what their work is like!

Find out more:

NASA: Explore Space Technology

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Clubs, competitions, and camps are some of the best ways to explore a career path and put your skills to the test in a friendly-competitive environment.

Clubs:

• Many schools at the pre university level offer rocketry courses or after school clubs for hands on launching – see what your community offers.
• Space Generation
• At a university there are many more opportunities to meet with like-minded students to explore aspects of aerospace engineering. Examples are:
  • MIT Flying Club or MIT Rocket Team – explore their projects here

Competitions: 

• FIRST Robotics Competition
• European Rocketry Challenge
• International Rocketry Challenge
• Team America Rocketry Challenge
• Learn about the Lucy in Space competition to spur an understanding of human exploration and discovery.
• NASA Solve offers multiple challenges for citizen scientists!

Camps:

• TryEngineering Summer Institute: Attend the TryEngineering Summer Institute to further your core engineering skills.
• Minority Introduction to Engineering and Science, Cambridge US: MIT program for senior preuniversity students who select five of 14 rigorous academic courses to study over a six-week residential program.

Many universities offer summer engineering experiences. Reach out to your local university’s engineering department to see what they offer.

Did you know you can explore aerospace engineering in your community? Think about the planes that land at your closest airport. Large or small, these planes have been developed and improved by aerospace engineers. If you want to consider how aerospace engineers help connect the globe, visit Flight Radar 24 and click on the city closest to where you live.

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  How many airplanes do you think are in the sky at any given moment?

• What technology do you think is used to track planes to avoid accidents?
• What do you think is the busiest flying day each year?
• How many people do you think manage flight operations in your area? In a large travel hub like London?
• What equipment needs to be on board a plane to have it show up in the flight radar system?

Find out more:

• Explore motor maintenance tips
• US Department of Energy: How does an internal combustion engine work?

Be sure to reach out to professional societies focused on engineering where you live. Not all will offer membership to pre-university students, but most offer groups for university students, and certainly offer online resources to help you explore the field. Some examples of groups focusing on aerospace engineering:

• American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, US
• Aerospace Industries Association, US
• American Astronautical Society, US
• Association Aéronautique et Astronautique de France, France
• Deutsche Gesellschaft für Luft- und Raumfahrt, Germany
• Hellenic Aeronautical Engineers Society, Greece
• IEEE Aerospace and Electronics Systems Society, US
• Royal Aeronautical Society, UK