The goal is to design and test a supersonic stage with an inlet Mach number in the range of 1.5-2. A supersonic stage will be designed and manufactured: first by a mean-line tool and then refined by steady and unsteady CFD simulations, as well as by blade profile and endwalls shape optimization. The design will consider the high unsteadiness in terms of magnitude and angles as typically expected at the inlet of the first stage. To get reliable unsteady inlet conditions, the RDC to turbine supersonic transition duct will also be designed. A robust optimization will also be run for both the stator and rotor. Stator and rotor cascades will then be tested separately in a cold linear blow-down wind tunnel. Specific devices for creating fluctuating inlet conditions are going to be studied and installed in the wind tunnel. Cascade inlet and outlet flow fields (both steady and fluctuating) will be measured and performance parameters calculated. Pressure measurements as well as schlieren visualization are foreseen. Unsteady CFD simulations tuned to the wind tunnel boundary conditions will also be conducted to further enhance the comprehension of the experimental findings. High fidelity CFD simulations and comparison with experimental results will support the performance assessment of the supersonic stage. Finally, a preliminary evaluation of the cooling requirements will be performed.