The Society's Annual Forum & Technology Display is the world's leading international technical event on vertical flight technology. The three-day meeting includes more than 200 technical papers on every discipline from Acoustics to Unmanned Systems. Forum Proceedings papers can be purchased as individual pdf files or as CD-ROMs from the Society's Online Store.
Every year, the best paper in each technical discipline is selected by the Society's Technical Committees. All of the best papers from each technical discipline from every Annual Forum since 2001 – including the overall Alfred Gessow Best Paper Award since 2004 – are recognized as some of the most important technical contributions in the field of vertical flight.
The Forum 65 (2009) winning technical papers are linked below.
| Technical Area | Title of Paper | Author(s) |
| Winner of the Alfred Gessow Forum Best Paper Award (Modeling & Simulation) |
A High Fidelity Brownout Model for Real-Time Flight Simulations and Trainers | Daniel A. Wachspress, Glen R. Whitehouse, Jeffrey D. Keller and Ke Yu, Continuum Dynamics, Inc.; Phillip Gilmore, Michael Dorsett and Kevin McClure, SAIC |
| Acoustics | Reduced In-Plane, Low Frequency Noise of an Active Flap Rotor | Ben W. Sim, NASA Ames Research Center; Ram D. JanakiRam, The Boeing Company; Natasha L. Barbely, NASA Ames Research Center and Eduardo Solis, Monterey Technologies, Inc. |
| Advanced Vertical Flight | Investigation of an Extremely Flexible Stowable Rotor | Jayant Sirohi, University of Texas at Austin and Anubhav Datta, ELORET Corporation |
| Aerodynamics | Investigation of Sediment Entrainment in Brownout Using High-Speed Particle Image Velocimetry | Bradley Johnson, J.Gordon Leishman and Anish Sydney, University of Maryland |
| Aircraft Design | Rotorcraft Operating Envelope Expansion Using Extendable Chord Sections | Olivier Leon, Eric Hayden and Farhan Gandhi, The Pennsylvania State University |
| Avionics and Systems | Rotorcraft Visual Situational Awareness Solving the Pilotage Problem for Landing in Degraded Visual Environments | Brian Sykora, BAE Systems |
| Crash Safety | Rotorcraft Fuel System Drop Test Simulation Methodology | Samgeeth Rajan, TEXTRON India Pvt. Ltd.; Cheng-Ho Tho and Michael R. Smith, Bell Helicopter Textron Inc. |
| Dynamics | Three-dimensional Finite Element Formulation and Scalable Domain Decomposition for High Fidelity Rotor Dynamic Analysis | Anubhav Datta, ELORET Corporation and Wayne Johnson, NASA Ames Research Center |
| Handling Qualities | A Method to Determine Maximum Flight Control Authority Through Hardover Failure Testing | Kevin Christensen, Helmuth Koelzer and Pat Hollifield, Bell Helicopter Textron Inc.; Les Wiggins and Michael Olmstead, US Army Aviation and Missile Command |
| Health and Usage Monitoring Systems | Impact Damage Detection for Fiberglass Composite Rotor Blade | Carson Budde, Nathanael Yoder, Douglas Adams, Peter Meckl and Dave Koester, Purdue University |
| History | The Lockheed Helicopter Experience | Raymond W. Prouty |
| Manufacturing Technology and Processing | Three-dimensional Model Based Manufacturing Work Instructions | Daniel Lichtner, Christopher J. Senesac and Robert J. Hagan, The Boeing Company |
| Operations | The First Combat Deployment of the CH-47F Improved Cargo Helicopter | Sean C. Magonigal, U.S. Army Aviation Technical Test Center and Joel A. West, U.S. Army |
| Product Support | Enhanced Erosion Protection for Rotor Blades | Warren (Andy) Thomas, Bell Helicopter Textron Inc.; Shek C. Hong, Hontek Corporation; Chin-Jye (Mike) Yu and Edwin L. Rosenzweig, Naval Air Systems Command |
| Structures and Materials | Strain-Based Fatigue for High-Strength Aluminum Alloys | N.E. Dowling, Attilio Arcari, C.A. Calhoun and D.C. Moore, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University |
| Systems Engineering | Methodologies and Tools to Support the Architecting of Complex Helicopter Avionics Systems | Michael G. Manninen, Robert K. Butler and Johnathan C. Lewis, Rockwell Collins |
| Test and Evaluation | MV-22B Osprey Short Takeoff and Minimum Run-On Landing Tests aboard LHD Class Ships | Virginia T. Mitchell, William P. Geyer, Naval Air Warfare Center |
| Unmanned VTOL | Vision-Based Target Recognition and Autonomous Flights Through Obstacle Arches with a Small UAV | Florian-M. Adolph, Franz Andert, Lukas Goormann, and Jörg S. Dittrich, German Aerospace Center (DLR) |