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Background:
Dr. Rafic Ajaj is an Associate Professor at the Department of Aerospace Engineering of Khalifa University of Science and Technology (KUST). He joined KUST in August 2019. Rafic is also a Visiting Academic in Aerospace Structures at the Aerodynamics and Flight Mechanics Group of the University of Southampton, UK. He manages the department's Flight Dynamics and Simulation Laboratory. Rafic is listed among Stanford University’s Top 2% Most Influential Scientists for single-year impact (2022–2025) and career-long impact (2025).
His research is mainly focused on VTOL aircraft, morphing wings, aircraft/UAV design, flight mechanics, aeroelasticity, and adaptive structures. In 2015, Rafic was awarded a Royal Academy of Engineering (RAEng) Industrial Secondment, which allowed him to work for one year at Airbus UK to develop a novel actuation system for folding wingtips used for load alleviation on large transport aircraft. A patent with Airbus UK was granted (US11203410B2) on this work. Rafic is also a fellow of the Higher Education Academy in the UK since 2015. In 2009, he received the Boeing UK Prize for the best master’s research project in aerospace engineering. He also received the Faculty of Engineering Award for the Most Outstanding Student in Integrated Aerospace Systems Design at the University of Bristol in 2009.
He is a member of the Royal Aeronautical Society (RAeS) and the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA). Rafic serves on the AIAA Adaptive Structures Technical Committee and the RAeS Membership Committee. In addition, he is a member of the editorial boards of Aerospace and the International Review of Aerospace Engineering.
Career History:
Between 2017 and 2019, he was an Assistant Professor of Aerospace Engineering at the Mechanical Engineering Department of the United Arab Emirates University, UAE.
Between 2013 and 2017, he worked as an Assistant Professor (Lecturer) of Aerospace Structures at the Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics of the University of Southampton, UK. While at Southampton, he was seconded to Airbus Operation Limited, Bristol, UK for 1 year.
Between 2009 and 2013, he worked as a Research Assistant in Aerospace Engineering on several EU-funded projects focused on morphing aircraft under the supervision of Professor Michael Friswell at the University of Bristol and Swansea University in the UK. In 2012, he was a Visiting Researcher at the Visionary Aircraft Concepts of Bauhaus Luftfarht e.V., Germany working on the flight dynamics of morphing aircraft for three months.
I am seeking a postdoctoral fellow in the area of "Morphing Aircraft Technologies.". I am also looking to recruit 1 PhD student (in the area of flight control) for the same project.
