Simulators and Simulations: their Characteristics and Applications to the Simulation and Control of Aerospace Vehicles 2003-01-3737

In this work we discuss some types of simulators and simulations, their characteristics and applications to the simulation and control of aerospace vehicles. This includes: the basic definitions, types and characteristics of simulators and simulations (physical, computational, hybrid, etc.; discrete events, discrete time, continuous time, etc; deterministic, stochastic, etc.) their basic compromise (simplicity × fidelity), their man-machine interfaces and interactions (virtual, constructive, live, etc.), their evolution law (time, events, mixed, etc.), their architectures (“standalone”, PIL, HIL, MIL, DIS, HLA, etc.), their environments (discrete, continuous, hybrid, etc.) and their applications to the simulation and control of aerospace vehicles. This is illustrated by some examples driven from the aerospace industry