Drivers pinched by skyrocketing gas prices can trade in their SUVs for hybrids. Airline industry executives and military leaders have no so such alternative.

Utah State University officials hope to change that situation with a patented invention that could save millions of dollars a year in jet fuel costs.

The invention of aerospace engineering professor Warren F. Phillips twists the wings of a plane as it flies, reducing the effects of wind resistance. After five years of working with a complicated mathematical equation, he awoke one morning with the solution. Phillips took up the sport of hang gliding 11 years ago, when he turned 50. He says that hang gliding gives him an intuitive understanding of the G-forces that affect airborne craft. "When you're flying an airplane, you're driving a machine. When you're hang gliding, it's like being a bird. You feel every interaction between the air and the wings, much more so than in a flying machine."

The concept of twisting wings has been around since the Wright brothers' first flight. Phillips' Twisteron replaces the flaps on a wing and is much more precise. It twists a plane's wings in the same direction in response to subtle changes in altitude, weight and speed.

If it weren't for wind resistance, or drag, a 747 pilot could switch off the engines once the plane reaches its cruising altitude. "You would still need the engines to climb and accelerate," Phillips says, but otherwise the plane would just cruise along. "Even a small reduction in drag would have a big impact on the airline industry and the U.S. economy." If jet fuel consumption and costs keep rising, as projected, the potential savings would approach $1 billion per year over the next decade.

A typical 747 makes a Humvee look like a paragon of energy efficiency. A 747 has to carry double its weight in jet fuel. At 750,000 pounds, it guzzles 75 gallons of fuel per minute. According to the Federal Aviation Administration, U.S civil aviation aircraft will consume 24 billion gallons of jet fuel in 2004, more gallons than the gallons of oil we import from the Persian Gulf in a year.

Utah State engineering students tested the Twisteron during the 2003 National Design, Build, Fly Competition sponsored by the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics. Their radio-controlled plane experienced a 7-to-20 percent reduction in drag, and their design report took first place.

Utah State officials hope commercial aircraft manufacturers will be similarly impressed when they learn about the licenses that are now available for the new technology. The technology could also be applied to water craft and land vehicles. -Jane Koerner