  We propose an Isogeometric approach for smoothing on surfaces, namely
estimating a function starting from noisy and discrete measurements. More
precisely, we aim at estimating functions lying on a surface represented by
NURBS, which are geometrical representations commonly used in industrial
applications. The estimation is based on the minimization of a penalized
least-square functional. The latter is equivalent to solve a 4th-order Partial
Differential Equation (PDE). In this context, we use Isogeometric Analysis
(IGA) for the numerical approximation of such surface PDE, leading to an
IsoGeometric Smoothing (IGS) method for fitting data spatially distributed on a
surface. Indeed, IGA facilitates encapsulating the exact geometrical
representation of the surface in the analysis and also allows the use of at
least globally $C^1-$continuous NURBS basis functions for which the 4th-order
PDE can be solved using the standard Galerkin method. We show the performance
of the proposed IGS method by means of numerical simulations and we apply it to
the estimation of the pressure coefficient, and associated aerodynamic force on
a winglet of the SOAR space shuttle.
