Mentor Graphics Corporation (NASDAQ: MENT) announced that its FloEFD™ computational fluid dynamics (CFD) software product was used by all state finalists in the annual Real World Design Challenge (RWDC), a national aviation design competition that was held in Washington D.C. on March 26-29. The 2010 RWDC National Champion is the team from Baldwin High School in Kansas, receiving their first place award on March 29 at The Smithsonian Air and Space Museum.

High school students from across the country are given the opportunity to work on a real world engineering challenge in a collaborative, team-based environment, applying lessons learned in the classroom to the technical challenges faced in today’s workplace. The theme of this year’s competition was “Green Aeronautical,” and the challenge was to improve the design of a business jet wing and tail to withstand specific physical conditions, while considering balance lift and weight—and thrust and drag—with zero pitching moments. A public and private partnership, the RWDC provides tools and resources to the schools to support Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) education. The Mechanical Analysis Division (MAD) of Mentor Graphics donated its leading FloEFD computational fluid dynamics software to all participating schools.

The Baldwin High School “Kansas Tornadoes” national champions, led by their teacher and coach Pam Davis, and mentor Sandy Barnes, is comprised of students Mason Johnson; Brandon Baltzell; Carson Barnes; Shelby Gregory; Carrie Deitz; MacHalpin and Austin Kraus. The second place team, from Iolani School in Hawaii, won last year’s RWDC event; the third place winners are from Hutchinson High School, Minnesota.

The aeronautical challenge requires the teams to apply the software, develop a paper on their findings, then make a presentation to a panel of expert judges. The judges then select the finalists and winning teams.

Mentor Graphics
www.mentor.com

::Design World::