A partnership between NASA and Draper Laboratory in the 1970s resulted in the first plane flown digitally, where a computer collected all of the input from the pilot’s controls and then used that information to command aerodynamic surfaces.
For the first 70 years of human flight, pilots used controls that connected directly to aircraft components through cables and pushrods. A partnership between NASA and Draper Laboratory in the 1970s resulted in the first plane flown digitally, where a computer collected all of the input from the pilot’s controls and then used that information to command aerodynamic surfaces. Today, so-called digital fly-by-wire systems are the norm in aviation.
Read more: http://spinoff.nasa.gov/Spinoff2011/t_5.html
Image credit: NASA