Apollo M. O. Smith

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Apollo M. O. Smith
UCLA
Significant advancecomputational fluid dynamics

Apollo Milton Olin Smith (usually referred to as A.M.O. Smith) (born July 2, 1911 – May 1, 1997) was an important figure in the aerodynamics field at

Douglas Aircraft from 1938 to 1975 and an early pioneer in the area of computational fluid dynamics
.

Early life

A.M.O. Smith was born in

Tsien Hsue-shen. This work led to the formation of Aerojet and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory
several years later.

Career

In June 1938, Smith was hired by the El Segundo Division of

H.H. Arnold, to help organize and develop the newly formed Aerojet company as its first Chief Engineer. Under his guidance, the engineering organization at Aerojet grew from six people to over 400 by the time he left. This period saw the development and quantity production of the JATO type rocket at Aerojet
.

After he returned to

F3D-1 Skynight
.

At the end of World War II, he was a member of the US Naval Technical Mission in Europe. In his three months touring captured German aeronautical facilities, he became familiar with the German work on the low drag properties of swept wings at transonic speeds and their development of tailless aircraft.

After returning to Douglas, he proposed and began studies for a tailless aircraft. These studies culminated in the design and production of the

Computational Fluid Dynamics. In 1954 he became Supervisor of Aerodynamics Research and from 1969 to 1975 he was Chief Aerodynamics Engineer - Research at Douglas. In this period, he oversaw development of practical methods of analyzing laminar and turbulent boundary layer flow, new and improved static pressure probes, the hydrogen bubble technique of flow visualization, potential flow analysis, analysis of stability and transition of boundary layers and the en method of predicting boundary layer transition. In June 1975, he retired from what was then McDonnell Douglas
.

After retiring, he was appointed Adjunct Professor at

UCLA
, a position he held from 1975 to 1980.

Personal life

Smith was married to Elisabeth Caroline Krost on December 5, 1943. They had three children, Tove Anne Smith, Gerard Nicholas Smith and Kathleen Roberta Smith.

References

  • Cebeci, Tuncer, Legacy of a Gentle Genius; The Life of A.M.O. Smith, Horizons Publishing, 1999.

See also
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