Considering the spanwise difference of both airfoil and aerodynamics boundary

an optimization design process of multi-section airfoils was developed. Inlet guide vane and large camber angle stator of a single-stage highly loaded compressor were taken as optimization subjects

and multi-section associated performance was taken as optimization target. MISES considering boundary layer transition was adopted to analyze the aerodynamic performance of airfoils

and genetic algorithm was also adopted to optimize the multi-section airfoils. The results show that

within the valid operating range

the front loading of multi-section airfoils increases after optimization

while the central and rear loading decreases

bring about performance improvement. Three-dimensional numerical simulation results show that

without large scale secondary flow

the optimization method of multi-section airfoils is practicable.