ERI: Multilevel Inverse Robust Co-Design of Materials, Products, and Manufacturing Processes

这个工程研究启动(ERI)项目的研究目标是探索在材料和产品设计的早期阶段共同考虑制造过程的新方法。通过在设计的早期阶段考虑制造过程，设计人员可以根据集成计算材料工程(ICME)的设想，做出有效的决策，以定制材料微结构并实现所需的产品性能。当前的材料设计方法侧重于在单个层次上按顺序探索材料和产品之间基于模型的关系，而不是在一个整体系统中同时实现产品、材料和制造。本项目设想的整体的、基于系统的、稳健的合作设计方法将考虑到涉及产品的多级材料系统和不确定性下的制造过程之间的目标和相互作用。该方法将使设计师能够同时可视化和探索特定级别的目标、多级别交互和子级别分析，从而实现数字设计中的量化联系，从材料结构到制造工作流程。该项目将通过战略性地整合系统工程、工程设计和材料科学领域的知识和技术来促进科学进步，使人们能够从根本上了解产品、材料和制造过程之间的联系。此外，通过设计嵌入ICME主题设计的新课程和组织有关工具的暑期班，学生和实践者将从系统的角度更好地准备应对复杂材料设计挑战。该ERI项目将建立将分层结构材料、产品及其制造过程的多级建模与多目标系统设计战略和不确定性管理相结合的基础技术。研究计划由两部分组成：(1)建立依赖历史的、数据驱动的处理-结构-特性-性能(PSPP)联系；(2)制定基于系统的反向协同设计框架，通过管理不确定性及其传播来探索跨越多个层次的一系列稳健的解决方案。总体预期结果是一个新颖的基于系统的多层次框架，用于材料、产品和制造过程的反向联合设计，由分散的利益相关者在不确定情况下做出稳健的决策。知识优势包括：(1)对多层次材料、制造过程和产品设计决策的相互依赖性质的基本理解；(2)实现产品的材料结构层次的有效数学表示；(3)在设计的早期阶段，用于多层次稳健的协同设计可视化和探索不同工程学科(设计、材料和制造)之间的相互作用的计算框架。计划开展四项相关的教育和外联活动，以便将这项研究与更广泛的学生和专业人员群体结合起来：(1)通过将结果纳入现有的研究生院课程，使以数据为导向的PSPP联动建模程序正规化；(2)通过一个新的ICME设计课程，迭代、更新和传播针对ICME标准问题的基于系统的设计方法；(3)举办为期一周的与ICME设计相关工具的在线暑期培训班；(4)通过科学出版物、专题演讲和研究专著广泛传播成果。这些活动将产生新的经过验证和确认的技术来教授ICME的设计；新的测试用例来迭代、评估和建立构造的通用实用程序(单独和集成)；以及为将多层次材料建模、制造考虑和基于决策的设计策略注入ICME工作流程奠定基础。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The research objective of this Engineering Research Initiation (ERI) project is to investigate new ways to co-consider manufacturing processes in the early stages of materials and product design. By including the considerations of manufacturing processes in the early stages of design, designers can make effective decisions to customize material microstructures and achieve desired product performance, as envisioned by Integrated Computational Materials Engineering (ICME). Current materials design methods focus on sequentially exploring model-based relations of materials and products at individual levels instead of a concurrent realization of products, materials, and manufacturing within a holistic system. The holistic, systems-based, robust co-design approach envisioned in this project will account for the goals of and interactions between multilevel material systems involving the product and the manufacturing processes under uncertainty. The approach will enable designers to concurrently visualize and explore level-specific objectives, multilevel interactions, and sublevel analyses, thus enabling quantitative linkages in digital design to materials structure to manufacturing workflows. The project will promote the progress of science by strategically integrating knowledge and techniques from the fields of systems engineering, engineering design, and materials science to enable a fundamental understanding of the couplings between products, materials, and manufacturing processes. Additionally, by designing new curricula that embed Design for ICME topics and organizing a summer school on the associated tools, students and practitioners will be better prepared to address complex materials design challenges from a systems perspective.This ERI project will establish foundational techniques for coupling multilevel modeling of hierarchically structured materials, products, and their manufacturing processes with multiobjective systems design strategies and uncertainty management. The research plan consists of two parts: (1) establish history-dependent, data-driven processing-structure-property-performance (PSPP) linkages; and (2) formulate a systems-based inverse co-design framework for exploring ranged sets of robust solutions across multiple levels by managing uncertainty and its propagation. The overall expected outcome is a novel systems-based multilevel framework for the inverse co-design of materials, products, and manufacturing processes in terms of robust decisions made by distributed stakeholders under uncertainty. The intellectual merit includes: (1) a fundamental understanding of the interdependent nature of multilevel materials, manufacturing processes, and product design decisions; (2) an efficient mathematical representation of material structure hierarchy to realize products; and (3) a computational framework for the multilevel robust co-design visualization and exploration of the interactions between the different engineering disciplines (design, material, and manufacturing) in the early stages of design. Four related educational and outreach activities are planned to integrate the research with the broader community of students and professionals: (1) formalize the data-driven PSPP linkage modeling procedure by integrating the results in existing graduate courses; (2) iterate, update, and disseminate a systems-based design approach for standard ICME problems through a new Design for ICME course; (3) organize a one-week online summer school on tools relevant to Design for ICME; and (4) broadly disseminate results through scientific publications, presentations, and research monographs. These activities will lead to new verified and validated techniques to teach Design for ICME; new test examples to iterate, assess, and establish the generic utility of the constructs (individually and integrated); and a foundation for infusing multilevel materials modeling, manufacturing considerations, and decision-based design strategies into ICME workflows.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.