Optimization of multibody systems based on the generalized-α projection method for DAEs

Efficient optimization strategy of multibody systems is developed in this paper. Augmented Lagrange method is used to transform constrained optimal problem into unconstrained form firstly. Then methods based on second order sensitivity are used to solve the unconstrained problem, where the sensitivity is solved by hybrid method. Generalized-α method and generalized-α projection method for the differential-algebraic equation, which shows more efficient properties with the lager time step, are presented to get state variables and adjoint variables during the optimization procedure. Numerical results validate the accuracy and efficiency of the methods is presented.     

A symbolic algorithm for the automatic computation of multitone-input harmonic balance equations for nonlinear systems

A symbolic algorithm is developed for the automatic generation of harmonic balance equations for multitone input for a class of nonlinear differential systems with polynomial nonlinearities. Generalized expressions are derived for the construction of balance equations for a defined multitone signal form. Procedures are described for determining combinations for a given output frequency from the desired set obtained from box truncated spectra and their permutations to automate symbolic algorithm. An application of method is demonstrated using the well-known Duffing–Van der Pol equation. Then the obtained analytical results are compared with numerical simulations to show the accuracy of the approach. The computation times for both the numerical solutions of equations versus the number of frequency components and the symbolic generation of the equations versus the power of nonlinearity are also investigated.     

Floquet–Bloch decomposition for the computation of dispersion of two-dimensional periodic,damped mechanical systems

Floquet–Bloch theorem is widely applied for computing the dispersion properties of periodic structures, and for estimating their wave modes and group velocities. The theorem allows reducing computational costs through modeling of a representative cell, while providing a rigorous and well-posed spectral problem representing wave dispersion in undamped media. Most studies employ the Floquet–Bloch approach for the analysis of undamped systems, or for systems with simple damping models such as viscous or proportional damping. In this paper, an alternative formulation is proposed whereby wave heading and frequency are used to scan the k-space and estimate the dispersion properties. The considered approach lends itself to the analysis of periodic structures with complex damping configurations, resulting for example from active control schemes, the presence of damping materials, or the use of shunted piezoelectric patches. Examples on waveguides with various levels of damping illustrate the performance and the characteristics of the proposed approach, and provide insights into the properties of the obtained eigensolutions.     

L-leap-accelerating the stochastic simulation of chemically reacting systems

Presented here is an L-leap method for accelerating stochastic simulation of well-stirred chemically reacting systems,in which the number of reactions occurring in a reaction channel with the largest propensity function is calculated from the leap condition and the number of reactions occurring in the other reaction channels are generated by using binomial random variables during a leap.The L-leap method can better satisfy the leap condition.Numerical simulation results indicate that the L-leap method can obtain better performance than established methods.     

On the use of the model proposed by Leonov for the explanation of a secondary plateau of the loss modulus in heterogeneous polymer–filler systems with agglomerates

The purpose of the presented work was to test the capability of the model proposed by Leonov (J Rheol 34:1039–1068, 1990) for the prediction of secondary plateaus on the storage and loss moduli during small-amplitude oscillatory shear flow experiments on filled or heterogeneous polymer melts. Though the occurrence of a plateau on the storage modulus can be well explained in the frame of a filler network, a plateau on the loss modulus can hardly be described with the classical models. In the Leonov model, the continuum of dissipative processes is attributed to the rupture of flocs of particles. Experiments with polyolefins filled with magnesium hydroxide show that there is a clear connection between the amount of agglomerates and the occurrence of a plateau on the loss modulus. However, the value of the critical strain for floc rupture that can be calculated from the experiment shows that the processes responsible for the low-frequency dissipation are rather changes of configuration within the agglomerates than floc rupture. These processes are not described by the Leonov model, and the predicted strain dependence of the plateau is not observed experimentally.     

Development of testing systems for dynamic assessment of sheet metal specimens

The work presented herein regards the analysis of an experimental technique for the execution of dynamic tensile tests on structural material sheet specimens. Dynamic tensile testing of sheet is becoming more important due to the need for more optimized vehicle crashworthiness analysis in the automotive industry. Positive strain-rate sensitivity, i.e. the strength increases with strain-rate, offers a potential for improved energy absorption during a crash event. Tests have been carried out in the Reliability and Safety Laboratory of the 2^nd Engineering Faculty of the Politecnico di Torino. Different types of testing techniques have been used to generate data under dynamic conditions. However, no guidelines are available for the testing method, specimen dimensions, measurement devices, and other important issues which are critical for the quality of the results. Accurate signal processing and curve smoothing are often necessary to make the testing data usable.     

Role of the Pressure for Validity of the Energy Equality for Solutions of the Navier–Stokes Equation

We prove that a weak solution of the Navier–Stokes system satisfies the energy equality if the associated pressure is locally square integrable. A similar statement is shown to hold for the Euler system.     

Use of Tikhonov’s regularization method for solving identification problem for elastic systems

We present a method for solving nonlinear inverse problems, which also include identification problems for elastic systems. The problems whose initial data contain an error are usually solved by regularization methods [1–5]. In the present paper, we give preference to Tikhonov’s regularization method, which has been widely used in the recent years in practice to increase the stability of computational algorithms for solving problems in various areas of mechanics [6–9].     

Closed-form steady-state solutions for forced vibration of second-order axially moving systems

Second-order axially moving systems are common models in the field of dynamics, such as axially moving strings, cables, and belts. In the traditional research work, it is difficult to obtain closed-form solutions for the forced vibration when the damping effect and the coupling effect of multiple second-order models are considered.In this paper, Green’s function method based on the Laplace transform is used to obtain closed-form solutions for the forced vibration of second-order axially moving s...     

The Difference Methods for the Solution of Singular-Perturbation for the Elliptic-Parabolic Differential Equation

In this paper it is discussed the difference method for the solution of singular perturbation pro-blems for the elliptic equations,involving small parameter in the higher derivatives.Asε=0 theoriginal equations are degenerated into the parabolic equations.Authors constructed special difference schemes by means of the boundary layer properties ofthe solutions of these problems as well as investigated the convergence of this scheme and asymptoticbehaviour of the solutions.Finally,a numerical example is given.     

Development of the Spectral Sturm–Liouville Method for the Solution of a Boundary-Value Problem for the Biharmonic Equation

We generalize the spectral Sturm–Liouville method for the solution of the biharmonic equation. The characteristic equation for the determination of eigenvalues is investigated and eigenfunctions are constructed. We determine the stress-strain state for a rectangular plate loaded by arbitrary forces on its sides. For an arbitrary external load, we obtain a relation for the stress-strain state in the form of a series in eigenfunctions. A method of integral moments for the determination of the coefficients of the series is proposed. The Saint-Venant principle is verified.     

On the global stabilization of Takagi–Sugeno fuzzy cascaded systems

This paper deals with the problem of the global stabilization for a class of cascade nonlinear control systems. It is well known that, in general, the global asymptotic stability of the cascaded subsystems does not imply the global asymptotic stability of the composite closed-loop system. In this paper, we give additional sufficient conditions for the global stabilization of a cascade nonlinear system. In particular, we consider a class of Takagi–Sugeno (TS) fuzzy cascaded systems. Using the so-called parallel distributed compensation (PDC) controller, we prove that this class of systems can be globally asymptotically stable. An illustrative example is given to show the applicability of the main result.     

The improvement of the general expression for the stress function Φ of the two-dimensional problem

In this paper, it is pointed that the general expression for the stress function of the plane problem in polar coordinates is incomplete. The problems of the curved bar with an arbitrary distributive load at the boundries can’t he solved by this stress function. For this reason, we suggest two new stress functions and put them into the general expression. Then, the problems of the curved bar applied with an arbitrary distributive load at r=a,b boundaries can be solved. This is a new stress function including geometric boundary constants.     

Numerical solutions of linear quadratic control for time-varying systems via symplectic conservative perturbation

Optimal control system of state space is a conservative system, whose approximate method should be symplectic conservation. Based on the precise integration method, an algorithm of symplectic conservative perturbation is presented. It gives a uniform way to solve the linear quadratic control (LQ control) problems for linear time-varying systems accurately and efficiently, whose key points are solutions of differential Riccati equation (DRE) with variable coefficients and the state feedback equation. The method is symplectic conservative and has a good numerical stability and high precision. Numerical examples demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method.     

On the averaging principle for one-frequency systems. An application to satellite motions

This paper is related to our previous works (Morosi and Pizzocchero in J. Phys. A, Math. Gen. 39:3673–3702, 2006; Nonlinear Dyn., 2008), on the error estimate of the averaging technique for systems with one fast angular variable. In the cited references, a general method (of mixed analytical and numerical type) has been introduced to obtain precise, fully quantitative estimates on the averaging error. Here, this procedure is applied to the motion of a satellite in a polar orbit around an oblate planet, retaining only the J ₂ term in the multipole expansion of the gravitational potential. To exemplify the method, the averaging errors are estimated for the data corresponding to two Earth satellites; for a very large number of orbits, computation of our estimators is much less expensive than the direct numerical solution of the equations of motion.     

Graphical Illustrations for the Nur-Byerlee-Carroll Proof of the Formula for the Biot Effective Stress Coefficient in?Poroelasticity

This work presents a graphically illustrated version of the Nur-Byerlee-Carroll proof of the formula for the Biot effective stress coefficient in poroelasticity. The original elegant proof was provided by Nur and Byerlee (J. Geophys. Res. 76:6414, 1971) for isotropic materials and extended by Carroll (J. Geophys. Res. 84:7510?C7512, 1979) to anisotropic materials. Although the application of this result is in poroelasticity or in the analysis of composite materials, the proof is an analytical thought experiment in linear elasticity, and should be appreciated as such.     

Observer-based synchronization scheme for a class of chaotic systems using contraction theory

In this paper, an adaptive synchronization scheme is proposed for a class of nonlinear systems. The design utilizes an adaptive observer, which is quite useful in establishing a transmitter–receiver kind of synchronization scheme. The proposed approach is based on contraction theory and provides a very simple way of establishing exponential convergence of observer states to actual system states. The class of systems addressed here has uncertain parameters, associated with the part of system dynamics that is a function of measurable output only. The explicit conditions for the stability of the observer are derived in terms of gain selection of the observer. Initially, the case without uncertainty is considered and then the results are extended to the case with uncertainty in parameters of the system. An application of the proposed approach is presented to synchronize the family of N chaotic systems which are coupled through the output variable only. The numerical results are presented for designing an adaptive observer for the chaotic Chua system to verify the efficacy of the proposed approach. Explicit bounds on observer gains are derived by exploiting the properties of the chaotic attractor exhibited by Chua’s system. Convergence of uncertain parameters is also analyzed for this case and numerical simulations depict the convergence of parameter estimates to their true value.     

The effects of chain conformation in the microfluidic entry flow of polymer–surfactant systems

An associative polymer–surfactant system has been used to observe the effects of chain conformation in the entry flow through a microfabricated planar 16:1:16 contraction–expansion geometry. The well-studied system of the flexible polymer poly(ethylene oxide) (PEO) and anionic surfactant sodium dodecyl sulfate (SDS) was used. Dilute polymer solutions with increasing SDS concentration were characterized in steady and dynamic shear, as well as capillary breakup extensional rheology. Based on this characterization, the primary quantitative difference is an increase in zero-shear viscosity as a result of the PEO chain expansion brought on by association of SDS surfactant micelles. However, these quantitatively similar solutions were observed to exhibit much more qualitatively different flow patterns via fluorescent streak imaging in the entry flow. In contrast to previous work on PEO solutions, the PEO–SDS systems were observed to transition to a steady viscoelastic flow regime characterized by stable lip vortices at much lower elasticity and Weissenberg numbers. The resulting insight gained regarding the utility of microfluidic flows in elucidating effects of subtle conformational changes further illustrates the potential for using microfabricated devices as rheometric tools for measuring the properties of dilute and weakly viscoelastic fluids.     

Order reduction of retarded nonlinear systems – the method of multiple scales versus center-manifold reduction

We compare two approaches for determining the normal forms of Hopf bifurcations in retarded nonlinear dynamical systems; namely, the method of multiple scales and a combination of the method of normal forms and the center-manifold theorem. To describe and compare the methods without getting involved in the algebra, we consider three examples: a scalar equation, a single-degree-of-freedom system, and a three-neuron model. The method of multiple scales is directly applied to the retarded differential equations. In contrast, in the second approach, one needs to represent the retarded equations as operator differential equations, decompose the solution space of their linearized form into stable and center subspaces, determine the adjoint of the operator equations, calculate the center manifold, carry out details of the projection using the adjoint of the center subspace, and finally calculate the normal form on the center manifold. We refer to the second approach as center-manifold reduction. Finally, we consider a problem in which the retarded term appears as an acceleration and treat it using the method of multiple scales only. Communicated by G. Rega