Soon, Indian fighter jets may no longer depend on fixed wings.
Instead, they could fly with morphing wings that adapt instantly to mission demands, a capability long explored by Airbus, NASA and DARPA but now making major strides inside India’s own aeronautics ecosystem.
India is moving decisively in this direction through a Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO)-supported programme that has successfully demonstrated morphing wing behaviour on a flight-capable platform.
A senior DRDO scientist directly involved in the research spoke to AGN, sharing insight into the hardware, the actuation system, the control logic and the future roadmap for scaling the design to next-generation combat aircraft.
This breakthrough goes beyond new materials. It represents a fundamental shift in how Indian aircraft may achieve stealth, manoeuvrability and endurance, using wings that reshape themselves continuously throughout a mission.
“An aircraft wing is always a compromise,” the DRDO scientist told AGN. “Morphing allows us to reconfigure it to suit different phases of flight with greater aerodynamic efficiency.”
After years of modelling and theory, India now has validated, dynamic morphing hardware capable of real-time geometric change in flight. The implications for both unmanned systems and future fighters like AMCA are substantial.
How DRDO’s shape-memory alloy morphing wing reshapes in flight for agility, stealth and efficiency
At the heart of the system is a shift away from hydraulic or electromechanical actuators toward Shape Memory Alloys (SMAs), lightweight smart metals that contract when heated and elongate as they cool.
The morphing wing segment, developed by CSIR–National Aerospace Laboratories (NAL) under DRDO funding, uses a 45-degree diagonally cut leading edge.
This enables the forward portion of the wing to droop smoothly when the SMA actuators contract, reshaping the camber into a more lift-efficient or manoeuvre-optimised configuration. As the SMA cools, the surface returns to its low-drag cruise shape.
The DRDO scientist described the capability in precise terms:
“We have achieved a leading-edge droop of up to six degrees on a flight-capable wing segment, adjusting camber in real time to improve lift and control.”
Because the surface changes without the exposed hinges, discontinuities or gaps of traditional control surfaces, the design naturally lends itself to stealthier airframes. Continuous shaping avoids the sharp radar-reflective edges associated with flaps and slats.
In effect, the technology enlarges India’s movement into continuous-surface flight control, one of the most promising directions in sixth-generation aircraft design worldwide.
High-speed morphing wing demonstrated
Where global morphing research often struggles is in actuation speed under load. India’s approach stands out.
Tests on a 300 mm-span micro air vehicle show the morphing segment can shift shape at 35 degrees per second, even with full propeller wash simulating real flight conditions.
“When commanded from zero to maximum droop, the wing reaches the target shape in 0.17 seconds,” DRDO told AGN. “It can track sinusoidal shape changes at one cycle per second, even when the propeller is producing airflow.”
This level of speed enables instantaneous adaptation throughout a sortie:
- During take-off, greater camber for increased lift
- During climb, shifting to a more efficient lift-to-drag balance
- During cruise, a clean, optimised low-drag section
- During combat manoeuvres, rapid geometry changes for higher agility and controllability
Crucially, because the shaping is smooth, airflow remains attached across the leading edge, allowing stronger performance at high angles of attack, where fighters spend much of their time in close-quarters engagements.
This behavioural smoothness is central to mission-adaptive aerodynamics, and a significant step beyond mechanical flap deflection.
Adaptive power distribution: The underappreciated breakthrough enabling practical morphing wings
One of the most important innovations is not visible at all: the power allocation logic that manages SMA actuation.
SMAs require electrical heating, meaning multiple wing segments can quickly become a power burden. For small UAVs, endurance is everything. For fighters, weight and energy management are equally critical.
To solve this, the DRDO-supported team engineered an adaptive control allocation algorithm that intelligently distributes electrical power across the morphing segments.
“We dynamically share power among multiple wing segments, doubling actuation speed without increasing the load on the onboard battery,” DRDO told AGN.
This means:
- no segment overdraws
- only the active segment is powered
- heat cycles are coordinated
- energy waste is minimised
- autonomous behaviour can scale without heavy electronics
Even under full airflow loading, the system required only a 5.6 percent average increase in energy consumption, proving operational viability.
At just 6 grams of electronics per segment, the architecture is lightweight enough not only for small UAVs, but for distributed morphing systems on larger wings where dozens of segments may be used simultaneously.
Why this matters: India positions itself for sixth-generation fighter architectures
Although the demonstrator is small, the engineering principles are not. They align directly with trends in Europe and the US toward morphing structures, mission-adaptive control surfaces and blended stealth geometries.
The team is already planning a multi-axis morphing wing capable of:
- coordinated leading-edge shaping
- coupled pitch and roll effects
- replacing flaps, elevons or slats
- reducing radar-visible edges
- enabling autonomous trim and control optimisation
“The next steps involve coordinated morphing, flight trials, and adapting the degree of shape change autonomously based on mission needs.”
This leads toward a mission-adaptive wing that behaves differently depending on where and how it is flown:
- stealthier in penetration profiles
- more manoeuvrable during dogfight manoeuvres
- more efficient during cruise and long-range missions
For future Indian combat aircraft, including AMCA, TEDBF and future UCAVs, such capability could provide a decisive operational advantage.
A future where Indian fighters adapt like living organisms in flight
With this demonstration, India has joined a small group of nations exploring dynamic, real-time morphing structures. But unlike many early Western experiments that remained conceptual, DRDO and CSIR–NAL have produced a flight-ready, controllable and energy-efficient implementation.
The DRDO scientist captured the ambition simply: “Our aircraft must adapt like a living organism, reshaping their wings in response to the sky around them.”
India’s morphing wing effort has moved from theory to tested reality. And although the first steps come from a micro air vehicle, the trajectory clearly points toward a new era in indigenous fighter design: wings that sense, respond and think.
Featured image: IDRW
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