Sensitivity analysis of linear elastic systems using domain parameterization and a mixed mutual energy principle (Q804362)

This paper focuses on a unified approach for explicit structural design sensitivity analysis of linear elastic systems. Several methods for determining first-order design sensitivity analysis are discussed and shape sensitivity analysis is presented in a general form as a calculus of variational problems over a varying domain. Of the basic methods for design sensitivity analysis, the direct differentiation method and an adjoint variable method are developed in a general, variational form on the basis of the mixed Hu-Washizu energy principle. A domain parametrization method, related to the mixed Eulerian-Lagrangian kinematic description, is introduced for the treatment of shape variation problems. Both the adjoint variable and direct differentiation methods are readily discretized for numerical implementations. Numerical implementation of the design sensitivity methods is discussed and two illustrative numerical examples are included. The first example is given for a simple material interface problem and the second one for the global shape design variations of a container model. The displacement-based finite element models are used to analyze these problems. They demonstrate that the two methods yield the same sensitivites. This is an elegant and meticulously researched exposition of the first- order structural sensitivity analysis of linear systems. The derivations presented herein may be evidently extended to nonlinear systems as well.