MBSE-Driven MDAO in Co-Architecture and Concurrent Engineering Workflows for Aircraft Development

The development of complex aerospace systems for new aircraft programs is increasingly challenged by the need for reduced development lead time and program costs, alongside demands for integration of new technologies, enhanced performance, and capabilities. Traditional sequential design processes often hinder these goals, resulting in suboptimal system designs due to localized optimization efforts and significant schedule disruptions caused by late-stage rework. This paper presents a digital engineering framework designed to overcome these limitations by integrating Model-Based Systems Engineering (MBSE) and Multidisciplinary Design Analysis and Optimization (MDAO) capabilities, facilitating a concurrent product development paradigm. The framework utilizes a federated architecture where discipline-specific analytical models are developed and managed by respective domain experts but integrated at the program level. Key enablers include distinct MBSE modeling approaches leveraging the Mission-Operational-Functional-Logical-Technical (MOFLT) framework for product definition and the Process-Methods-Tools (PMT) package for analysis workflow specification. A novel ontology-based parameter management system, implemented using a graph database, provides the crucial mechanism for seamless, consistent data exchange between the MBSE environment and the federated MDAO workflows, resolving parameter heterogeneity issues. The proposed integrated approach aims to manage system complexity more effectively, accelerate development cycles, reduce costs associated with rework, enable the pursuit of globally optimized designs, and improve requirements verification and validation through automated, closed-loop data exchange. In this study, these capabilities are applied and demonstrated for a system of systems Co-Architecture design with a coupled analysis of an overall aircraft design model, costing model and industrial & logistics model for development of a notional aircraft using publicly available information.