Title of Paper:Wrinkle-free design of thin membrane structures using stress-based topology optimization

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Date of Publication:2017-05-01

Journal:JOURNAL OF THE MECHANICS AND PHYSICS OF SOLIDS

Included Journals:SCIE、EI

Volume:102

Page Number:277-293

ISSN No.:0022-5096

Key Words:Thin membrane; Wrinkle; Topology optimization; Principal stress criterion; Stress relaxation

Abstract:Thin membrane structures would experience wrinkling due to local buckling deformation when compressive stresses are induced in some regions. Using the stress criterion for membranes in wrinkled and taut states, this paper proposed a new stress-based topology optimization methodology to seek the optimal wrinkle-free design of macro-scale thin membrane structures under stretching. Based on the continuum model and linearly elastic assumption in the taut state, the optimization problem is defined as to maximize the structural stiffness under membrane area and principal stress constraints. In order to make the problem computationally tractable, the stress constraints are reformulated into equivalent ones and relaxed by a cosine-type relaxation scheme. The reformulated optimization problem is solved by a standard gradient-based algorithm with the adjoint-variable sensitivity analysis. Several examples with post-bulking simulations and experimental tests are given to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed optimization model for eliminating stress-related wrinkles in the novel design of thin membrane structures. (C) 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.