SBIR Phase II: A Toolbox for Optimal Design

这个小型企业创新研究(SBIR)第二阶段项目将波传播现象的大规模模拟与优化相结合。模拟本身很少是最终目标。相反，模拟通常是解决实际问题的迭代过程中的一个步骤，这可能是从间接测量、成像、参数估计或优化设计等方面确定材料属性。所有这些问题都需要将一个大型模拟程序包与一个优化程序包结合起来。该项目将使这一概念正式化，并着手创建一套工具，以促进在瞬变波传播现象领域的这种耦合，特别应用于压电换能器设计、石油勘探和生产以及优化和保护结构设计。选择这些应用程序是为了举例说明工具箱的用法，并强调其通用性。它将把波传播有限元系统和三维正反向地质建模系统与一些优化程序结合起来。拟议解决方案的目标市场是需要一套负担得起的设计工具的中小型公司，这些工具将覆盖许多不同类别的应用领域，而这些领域以前只有大公司才能使用。该项目的成果将对大量依赖计算机辅助设计和工程来开发产品的中小型行业产生广泛的影响，加快和提高从产品构思、生产到市场推介的过程，这是竞争激烈的世界的关键。

This Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase II project combines large-scale simulation of wave propagation phenomena with optimization. Simulation in itself is seldom a final objective. Rather, simulation is usually a step in an iterative process to solve the real problem, that could be the determination of material properties from indirect measurements, imaging, parameter estimation or optimal design, to name a few. All these problems share the need to couple a large simulation package with an optimization one. This project will formalize this concept and proceed to create a set of tools to facilitate this coupling in the area of transient wave propagation phenomena, with special applications to piezoelectric transducer design, oil exploration and production, and optimal and protective structural design. These applications are chosen to exemplify the usage of the toolbox and emphasize its generality. It will couple a wave propagation finite element system and a system for 3D forward and inverse geological modeling, with a number of optimization programs.The target market for the proposed solution is small to medium sized companies in need of a set of affordable design tools that will cover a number of different classes of application areas which have been previously available only to large firms. The results of this project will have a broad impact on a large number of small and medium size industries that rely on Computer Aided Design and Engineering to develop their products, accelerating and making more efficient the process between product conception, production and market introduction, key in a highly competitive world.