validate the computational predictive tools they developed to design the craft. LASRE was a small, half-span model of a lifting body with eight thrust cells of an aerospike engine. The experiment, mounted on the back of an SR-71 Blackbird aircraft, operated like a kind of "flying wind tunnel." The experiment focused on determining how a reusable launch vehicle's engine plume would affect the aerodynamics of its lifting-body shape at specific altitudes and speeds reaching approximately . The interaction of the aerodynamic flow with the engine plume could create drag; design refinements look to minimize that interaction. Lunar Landing Research Vehicle The Lunar Landing Research Vehicle or LLRV was an Apollo Project era program to build a simulator for the Moon landing. The LLRVs, humorously referred to as "Flying Bedsteads", were used by the FRC, now known as the Armstrong Flight Research Center, at Edwards Air Force Base, California, to study and analyze piloting techniques needed to fly and land the Apollo Lunar Module in the moon's airless environment. Aircraft on display NB-52B Balls 8 NASA 008 Bell X-1E AF Ser. No. 46-063 F-104N - NASA 826 F-8 Supercritical wing - NASA 810 F-8 Digital Fly-by-wire - NASA 802 F-15B ACTIVE - NASA 837 Grumman X-29 - NASA 849 Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird LASRE - NASA 844 Northrop HL-10 Lifting Body - NASA 804 Rockwell HiMAT Gallery Notable employees Neil Armstrong Marta Bohn-Meyer Bill Dana C. Gordon Fullerton David Hedgley Bruce Peterson R. Dale Reed David Scott Milt Thompson See also Gromov Flight Research Institute - the Russia counterpart of the Armstrong Flight Research Centre List of aerospace flight test centres References External links X-Press official newsletter Photo Collection for NASA Dryden Flight Research Center The Spoken Word: Recollections of Dryden History, the Early Years, edited by Curtis Peebles Flight Research: Problems Encountered and What They Should Teach Us by Milton O. Thompson—The early days of the DFRC Aerospace research institutes Aviation research institutes Buildings and structures in Kern County, California Edwards Air Force Base NASA facilities NASA visitor centers Space technology research institutes Science and technology in Greater Los Angeles Aerospace engineering organizations Flight Research Center NASA research centers