Configuration Modeling, Design, and Analysis

该奖项的研究目标是将几何和实体建模的成功扩展到配置空间建模。该提案将开发配置建模的理论基础和计算基础设施，并将开发的工具应用于机械系统的综合和分析，包括机构工作空间设计和分析，广义扫描，移动形状设计和对称性检测。 六维位形空间传统上与刚性固体的位形空间相关联。 但是一个立体本身也可以被认为是一组构形，因此是构形空间的一个子集。这种观察消除了形状和它们的配置之间的人为区别，并允许在机械设计和制造中的一大类问题的新配方。高效和实用的计算解决方案，新制定的问题，依靠现代计算机体系结构，如图形处理单元，将开发作为本research.If成功的一部分，这项研究将导致重大进展，在计算设计，使配置建模工具的全部权力，以前被认为是计算不可行的设计和分析问题的解决方案。 这项研究的预期更广泛的影响是三方面的。 对于计算分析和设计（CAD）行业，这项研究将导致新一代的计算工具，将显着改善和增强他们的软件产品。对于美国制造商来说，配置设计和分析是一个关键工具，可以实现快速和改进的（重新）设计，灵活和可重新配置的制造，有效的成本研究和推动创新。 对于研究和教育，这项研究填补了一个主要的概念差距分离（刚性）实体建模和配置建模，顺利整合形状信息与物理和虚拟运动。

The research objective of this award is to extend the success of geometric and solid modeling to configuration space modeling. The proposal will develop theoretical foundations and computational infrastructure for configuration modeling and will apply the developed tools to synthesis and analysis of mechanical systems, including mechanism workspace design and analysis, generalized sweeps, moving shape design, and symmetry detection. The six-dimensional configuration space is traditionally associated with the space of configurations of a rigid solid. But a solid itself can be also considered to be a set of configurations, and therefore a subset of a configuration space. This observation removes the artificial distinction between shapes and their configurations, and allows a new formulation of a large class of problems in mechanical design and manufacturing. Efficient and practical computational solutions to the newly formulated problems, relying on modern computer architectures such as graphics processing units, will be developed as part of this research.If successful, this research will lead to major advances in computational design by bringing the full power of configuration modeling tools to solution of the design and analysis problems previously considered computationally infeasible. The expected broader impact of this research is threefold. For the computational analysis and design (CAD) industry, this research will lead to a new generation of computational tools that will significantly improve and enhance their software products. For United States manufacturers, configuration design and analysis is a critical tool in enabling rapid and improved (re)design, flexible and reconfigurable manufacturing, effective cost studies, and driving innovation. For research and education, this research fills a major conceptual gap separating (rigid) solid modeling and configuration modeling that smoothly integrates shape information with physical and virtual motions.