"The perturbation field induced by a line vortex in a supersonic stream and the downwash behind a supersonic lifting surface are examined to establish approximate methods for determining the downwash behind supersonic wings. Lifting-lines methods are presented for calculating supersonic downwash. A bent lifting-line method is proposed for computing the downwash field behind swept wings. When applied to triangular wings with subsonic leading edges, this method gives results that, in general, are in good agreement with the exact linearized solution" (p. 635).

From Introduction: "The aerodynamic heating problem assumes considerable importance at high-supersonic speeds. Sanger and Bredt (reference 1) have calculated the high-speed aerodynamic forces and equilibrium surface temperature at extremely high altitudes where the molecular mean free path is large (free-molecule-flow region) compared with a characteristic body dimension. The theoretical investigation of Lees (reference 2) on the stability of the laminar boundary layer in compressible flow indicates that the laminar boundary layer is completely stable at all Reynolds numbers at supersonic speeds for a sufficiently low ratio of surface temperature to stream temperature."