Multi-Material Topology Optimization of Thermo-Elastic Structures with Stress Constraint

Abstract

This paper proposes a multi-material topology optimization formulation for thermo-elastic structures considering coupled mechanical and uniform thermal loads. The ordered-SIMP multiple materials interpolation model is introduced, combined with examples considering structural volume minimization under stress constraints. The p-norm function with the adjusted coefficient was adopted to measure the global maximum stress. The adjoint variable method is presented to discuss the sensitivity of stress constraints, and the method of moving asymptotes (MMA) is utilized to update the design variables. The results demonstrate that clear topologies are obtained for complicated multiple material combinations with various temperature values. Meanwhile, the optimized configuration with stress constraints has clear sensitivity to uniform temperature variations. Therefore, the proposed model demonstrates the necessity of a thermo-elastic model influenced by temperature in optimization.

Keywords

• multi-material design
• topology optimization
• stress constraint
• thermo-elastic structure