ADVANCED MODEL DEVELOPMENT FOR COUPLED TREATMENT OF FLUID STRUCTURE INTERACTIONS (FSI) AND CONJUGATE HEAT TRANSFER (CHT) IN SCRAMJET PROPULSION SYSTEMS IS CURRENTLY A LEADING AREA OF RESEARCH DUE TO THE EFFECTS OF HIGH HEATING RATES ON THE STRUCTURE. THERMALLY-INDUCED STRUCTURAL EXPANSION AND DISTORTIONS AND THE RESULTING IMPACT ON THE FLOW ALTER THE EXPECTED BEHAVIOR OF SCRAMJET ENGINES WHICH CAN LEAD TO SIGNIFICANT LOSS OF PERFORMANCE AND STABILITY. THE OBJECTIVES OF THIS RESEARCH ARE TO SYSTEMATICALLY ADDRESS THIS NEED BY: 1) DEVELOPING A PHYSICS-BASED MODEL FRAMEWORK FOR FULLY-COUPLED TREATMENT OF FSI AND CHT IN RELEVANT SCRAMJET CONFIGURATIONS AND 2) DEVELOPING EFFECTIVE STRATEGIES FOR IMPLEMENTING THEM IN STATE-OF-THE-ART COMPUTATIONAL FLUID DYNAMICS (CFD) SOLVERS. RESEARCH AIMED AT ACHIEVING THIS GOAL WILL BE FOCUSED ON THE FULLY-COUPLED PROBLEM RATHER THAN THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE INDIVIDUAL SOFTWARE TOOL COMPONENTS. MAJOR GOALS ARE TO ESTABLISH A VALIDATED FRAMEWORK THAT ENABLES FULLY-COUPLED FSI/CHT/CFD SIMULATIONS TO BE PERFORMED AT A MUCH HIGHER LEVEL OF FIDELITY THAN IS CURRENTLY PRACTICAL WHILE SIMULTANEOUSLY WORKING CLOSELY WITH OUR TECHNICAL ADVISOR DR. TOMASZ DROZDA AND COLLEAGUES AT NASA LANGLEY RESEARCH CENTER (LARC) TO TRANSITION THESE STRATEGIES INTO THE VULCAN-CFD CODE FRAMEWORK.