Micro Air Vehicles (MAV) are tiny, batterypowered, remotely piloted flying vehicles that can be used for a variety of civilian and military applications to minimize human danger.  Some potential applications include searching buildings or caves for terrorists, probing damaged nuclear power plants for radiation leaks, or searching collapsed mine shafts for survivors.  The United States Air Force wants to develop bird-sized MAV by 2015 and insect-sized vehicles by 2030. 

Wright State University (WSU) formed a MAV Research Center as part of the College of Engineering and Computer Science under the direction of Dr. George Huang.  The University received a grant from the Defense University Research Instrumentation Program for its MAV work. 

Part of the MAV research and development effort includes using Computation Fluid Dynamics (CFD) to evaluate MAV concepts and designs.  Simulating MAV propulsion systems requires software that can easily model moving grids, one of the strengths of the Software Cradle SC/Tetra CFD product.   

On April 13, 2009 WSU demonstrated a remotely controlled four winged sparrow-sized MAV with beating wings.  The MAV was designed by Cheng-Kuei Hsu a postdoctoral researcher.  The tiny machine weighed 10 grams, about the weight of two nickels.   A video of the WSU MAV can be seen here.