The Indian Institute of Technology Bombay is organising an Institute Lecture on Tuesday, December 2, 2025. Details of the lecture are provided below:

Title: "Innovation in Jet Noise Reduction Technology"

Speaker: Dr. Vinod G. Mengle, Founder and CEO of Aero Insights, LLC; Formerly with Boeing as Chief Chevron Design Architect

About the Speaker: 
Dr. Vinod G. Mengle is an internationally well-known research engineer and inventor in aeroacoustics, specializing in aircraft jet noise reduction. He is best known for conceiving the Azimuthally Varying Chevrons — the distinctive serrations on engine nozzle lips now featured on several new Boeing aircraft.

At Boeing, he served as the Chief Chevron Design Architect and Subject Matter Expert in Engine Noise Control. Earlier, he was the Principal Investigator in Aeroacoustics at Rolls-Royce and GE, and also led specialized tiger teams to solve nozzle and turbomachinery flutter problems.

Before entering industry in 1989, Dr. Mengle was a Professor of Aerospace Engineering at UCLA and also worked at NASA. He is currently the Founder and CEO of Aero Insights, LLC, consulting startups on R&D and conceptual designs for noise reduction of supersonic aircraft and eVTOL systems.

An alumnus of IIT Kanpur (B.Tech., 1977), he earned his M.S. and Ph.D. from Cornell University, supported by the John McMullen Graduate Fellowship. He holds 20 patents and is a Fellow of NASA, Boeing, and the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA).

Abstract of the talk: Noise from aircraft jet engines during take-off and landing remains one of aviation’s key environmental challenges and could ultimately limit future air transportation growth. NASA’s 1995 Environmental Charter identified a fourfold reduction in jet noise within 25 years as one of its Three Pillars of Success.

This lecture highlights innovative jet noise reduction concepts and technologies that Dr. Mengle conceived and experimentally validated during his 35+ years of career at Boeing, Rolls-Royce, GE and Aero Insights. Among them are the now-familiar serrations on engine nozzle lips, known as chevrons, and their adaptive versions made from shape-memory alloys (SMA)—tested at model scale and in full-scale flight tests, and now featured on aircraft such as the Boeing 747-8 and 737 MAX. The pioneering advances he made in lobe-mixer designs to reduce jet noise in supersonic planes and medium-thrust engines will also be presented.

Jet noise control blends aerodynamics, acoustics, materials science, and environmental engineering, where experiments often guide theory. The talk will show how first-principles physics and creative experimentation can lead to practical designs that help make commercial aviation quieter and more sustainable.