A STRATEGY FOR SIMULATION-BASED DESIGN OF MULTISCALE, MULTI-FUNCTIONAL PRODUCTS AND ASSOCIATED DESIGN PROCESSES

摘要

Simulation Based Engineering Science (SBES) is an evolving interdisciplinary research area rooted in the methods for modeling multiscale, multi-physics events. The objective in SBES is to develop methodologies that are foundational to designing multiscale systems by accounting for phenomena at multiple scales of lengths and time. Some of the key challenges faced in SBES include lack of methods for bridging various time and length scales, management of models and uncertainty associated with them, management of huge amount and variety of information, and methods for efficient decision making based on the available models. Although efforts have been made to address some of these challenges for individual application domains, a domain independent framework for addressing these challenges associated with multiscale problems is not currently available in the literature. In this paper, we make a clear distinction between multiscale modeling and multiscale design. Multiscale modeling deals with efficient integration of information from multiscale models to gain a holistic understanding of the system, whereas multiscale design deals with efficient utilization of information to satisfy design objectives. Our focus in this paper is on multiscale design. In order to address the challenges associated with multiscale design, we propose a domain independent strategy that is based on understanding the generic interaction patterns between models at multiple scales. The design strategy outlined in this paper has as its foundation a systems-based approach for designing design processes (meta-design) and robust design. The concepts are illustrated with a multiscale design problem from materials domain.