Recent Advances in the Knowledge of Transonic Air Flow

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Abstract
The most powerful theoretical tool in the solution of the aerodynamic problems of aircraft is the theory of small perturbations, which states that if a wing is thin (or a body slender), and if the incidence is small, then in inviscid flow the fluid velocity at any point can be treated as a small perturbation from the stream velocity. The backbone of our knowledge of the aerodynamics of aircraft is provided by this theory, to which the effects of thick wings and large incidences, and the effect of viscosity, introducing as it does the concept of boundary layers, can be added as additional or correction effects. It is known that at subsonic and again at supersonic speeds, the theory of small perturbations is a linear theory; that is, the assumptions implicit in it lead to a linear partial differential equation for the velocity potential, with linear boundary conditions.

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