Date: Tue, 26 Nov 1996 00:09:49 GMT Server: NCSA/1.5 MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: text/html Last-modified: Fri, 26 Jul 1996 15:49:28 GMT Content-length: 9023 Notre Dame MDO [ U_N_I_V_E_R_S_I_T_Y___o_f___N_O_T_R_E___D_A_M_E ]

Multidisciplinary Design Technology Development:

A Comparative Investigation of
Integrated Aerospace Vehicle Design Tools

NASA Langley Research Center
Grant Number NASA-NAG-1-1561
January 1, 1994 through December 31, 1996
Project Monitor: Dr. Jaroslaw Sobieski


Principal Investigators:

Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering:
John E. Renaud, Ph.D., P.E.
Stephen M. Batill, Ph.D., P.E.

Computer Science and Engineering:
Jay B. Brockman, Ph.D.

Graduate Students:

Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering:
Jose Rodriguez
Richard Sellar
Marc Stelmack
Jian Su
Ravindra V. Tappeta
Brett A. Wujek

Computer Science and Engineering:
Eric Johnson
Arun N. Lokanathan
Stan Yoder



Introduction and Goals:

The purpose of this three-year reseach project (1994-1996) is to develop a framework and systematic methodology to facilitate the application of Multidisciplinary Design Optimization (MDO) to a diverse class of system design problems. MDO is based upon the philosophy of identifying the appropriate combination of parameters which are under the control of a designer (or design team) and which will result in the most effective product or system. For all practical aerospace systems, the design of a systems is a complex sequence of events which integrates the activities of a variety of discipline "experts" and their associated "tools". The development, archiving and exchange of information between these individual experts is central to the design task. It is this information which provides the basis for these experts to make their design decisions - resulting in the final product.

The development of MDO has been inextricably tied to developments in computer hardware and software. Advanced analysis tools such as computational fluid dynamics (CFD) and finite element analysis (FEA) have now been integrated into the daily activities of many designers. However, design decisions are often based on a variety of information sources, analytic, numerical simulation, design heuristic or even "intuition". The development and integration of this information using "high powered computing" tools has begun to demonstrate the true potential of MDO.

A variety of methods and applications are being considered. In each case the fundamental approach is to provide the individual discipline expert with the information necessary to evaluate the system as a whole and to be able to understand the impact of individual decisions on the overall system design. The methods being considered include extensions to Global Sensitivity Equations (GSE), the application of artificial neural networks for design space mapping and the integration of distributed computing and process scheduling into the MDO environment.

The current research effort is a joint program between the Departments of Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering and the Computer Science and Engineering Departments at the University of Notre Dame. The coordination of efforts within the project is based upon identification of a series of Demonstration Problems , the formulation of a number of MDO Algorithms and specific Design Tool Development. Test problem and algorithm development provide a focus for the efforts of each of these individual researchers. These problems are being selected so that they represent a diverse spectrum of MDO applications and will present a variety of challenges for the methods being developed and evaluated as part of this research program. As this three year program continues, information related to each of the primary phases of the project will be added to this document. The results of those issues identified as Future Efforts will be used to assess applicability of the MDO tools to a wide variety of applications. A number of references are available which outline various developments associated with this research program.


The Annual Report which summarizes the research activities from October 1994 to October 1995 can be accessed and the slides used for the Annual Presentation at NASA Langley Research Center on October 16, 1995 are being processed for posting on this web site.


The following are a selection of recent publications developed as part of this research program. Many are attached as postscipt files and if you have a postscript viewer they should be accessible for review and copying. If you are unable to access any of these papers and are interested in receiving a copy, please contact - via email - any of the Principal Investigators listed above.