Is it a bird, is it a plane? Well kind of, it's the latest development in green aviation and it looks rather like something from the Jetsons.

Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) this week took the wraps off two new aircraft designs, which they claim could cut aviation fuel use by 70 per cent and deliver similarly deep cuts in air and noise pollution.

The faculty at the Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics presented the designs to NASA last month as part of a $2.1m (£1.5m) research programme intended to develop environmental and performance concepts that will shape the agency's aeronautics research over the next 25 years.

As part of the project the MIT team was tasked with developing two new commercial aircraft designs that would burn 70 per cent less fuel, emit 75 per cent less nitrogen oxides (NOx) than current planes and could take off using significantly shorter runways.

They delivered a design for a 180-passenger plane, dubbed the "double bubble " series, which could serve as a replacement for the Boeing 737-class aircraft that are widely used for short-haul flights.

That design was accompanied by plans for a 350-passenger H "hybrid wing body " plane to replace the 777-class aircraft commonly used for international flights.

According to Mark Drela, lead designer of the D Series, the design would have to travel about 10 per cent slower than a 737, but he added that the repositioning of the engines at the rear of the plane, use of longer wings and reconfiguring of the cross section would significantly reduce drag, allowing engines to burn less fuel for the same amount of thrust.

"Little five per cent changes add up to one big change," he said in a statement, adding that while the plane would be slower than current commercial aircrafts, time could be saved on commercial routes because the plane's design would allow for faster loading and unloading.

The aim of the NASA-backed project is to deliver designs that could be turned into a commercial reality by 2035, but the MIT team also provided designs for a version of the D Series that could be built using conventional aluminum and existing jet technology that could feasibly be produced sooner and would still cut fuel use in half.

The larger H Series design uses similar principles to the D Series, positioning the engine at the rear of the aircraft and using longer, thinner wings. But it also features a triangular-shaped hybrid wing body design that allows for more passengers and improved aerodynamics.

The MIT research is part of a wide-ranging project from NASA that has also seen Boeing, GE Aviation and Northrop Grumman contracted to undertake research into next-generation subsonic commercial aircraft designs, and Boeing and Lockheed-Martin tasked with exploring how supersonic jets could be used for commercial aircraft.

The MIT team now hopes to receive a decision from NASA within the next few months on whether it has been selected for the second phase of the programme, which will provide it with funding to continue research into how new propulsion system technology could be integrated with the designs.

MIT said that even if the designs are not chosen for the second phase of the project, the research team hopes to continue work on them through the testing of smaller models at the Institute's own wind tunnel and ongoing work with aircraft manufacturers.