An inverse hyperbolic heat conduction problem in estimating surface heat flux of a living skin tissue

In this study, an inverse algorithm based on the conjugate gradient method and the discrepancy principle is applied to solve the inverse hyperbolic heat conduction problem in estimating the unknown time-dependent surface heat flux in a living skin tissue from the temperature measurements taken within the tissue. The inverse solutions will be justified based on the numerical experiments in which three different heat flux distributions are to be determined. The temperature data obtained from the direct problem are used to simulate the temperature measurements. The influence of measurement errors upon the precision of the estimated results is also investigated. Results show that an excellent estimation on the time-dependent surface heat flux can be obtained for the test cases considered in this study.     

An inverse non-Fourier heat conduction problem approach for estimating the boundary condition in electronic device

This study is intended to provide an inverse method for estimating the unknown boundary condition T(0,y,t) in a non-Fourier heat conduction electronic device. In this study, finite-difference methods are employed to discretize the problem domain, and then a linear inverse model is constructed to identify the unknown boundary condition. The present approach is to rearrange the matrix forms of the differential governing equations and to estimate the unknown conditions. Then, the linear least-squares method is adopted to obtain the solution.The results show that one measuring point is sufficient to estimate the unknown boundary condition T(0,y,t) without measurement errors. When considering the measurement errors, the magnitudes of the discrepancies in the boundary condition T(0,y,t) are directly proportional to the size of measurement errors. Due to the complicated reflection and interaction of the thermal waves, this phenomenon reflects the fact that the inverse non-Fourier heat conduction problem is different from the inverse Fourier heat conduction problem.In contrast to the traditional approach, the advantage of applying this method in inverse analysis is that no prior information is needed on the functional form of the unknown quantities. In addition, no initial guess is required and the calculation can be done in only one iteration.     

Isospectral flow method for nonnegative inverse eigenvalue problem with prescribed structure

The nonnegative inverse eigenvalue problem is that given a family of complex numbers λ={λ₁,…,λ_n}, find a nonnegative matrix of order n with spectrum λ. This problem is difficult and remains unsolved partially. In this paper, we focus on its generalization that the reconstructed nonnegative matrices should have some prescribed entries. It is easy to see that this new problem will come back to the common nonnegative inverse eigenvalue problem if there is no constraint of the locations of entries. A numerical isospectral flow method which is developed by hybridizing the optimization theory and steepest descent method is used to study the reconstruction. Moreover, an error estimate of the numerical iteration for ordinary differential equations on the matrix manifold is presented. After that, a numerical method for the nonnegative symmetric inverse eigenvalue problem with prescribed entries and its error estimate are considered. Finally, the approaches are verified by the numerical test results.     

A numerical method for solving an inverse thermoacoustic problem

In this paper, we consider an inverse problem of determining the initial condition of an initial boundary value problem for the wave equation with some additional information about solving a direct initial boundary value problem. The information is obtained from measurements at the boundary of the solution domain. The purpose of our paper is to construct a numerical algorithm for solving the inverse problem by an iterative method called a method of simple iteration (MSI) and to study the resolution quality of the inverse problem as a function of the number and location of measurement points. Three two-dimensional inverse problem formulations are considered. The results of our numerical calculations are presented. It is shown that the MSI decreases the objective functional at each iteration step. However, due to the ill-posedness of the inverse problem the difference between the exact and approximate solutions decreases up to some fixed number k _min, and then monotonically increases. This shows the regularizing properties of the MSI, and the iteration number can be considered a regularization parameter.     

Inverse determination of thermal conductivity using semi-discretization method

In this work a semi-discretization method is presented for the inverse determination of spatially- and temperature-dependent thermal conductivity in a one-dimensional heat conduction domain without internal temperature measurements. The temperature distribution is approximated as a polynomial function of position using boundary data. The derivatives of temperature in the differential heat conduction equation are taken derivative of the approximated temperature function, and the derivative of thermal conductivity is obtained by finite difference technique. The heat conduction equation is then converted into a system of discretized linear equations. The unknown thermal conductivity is estimated by directly solving the linear equations. The numerical procedures do not require prior information of functional form of thermal conductivity. The close agreement between estimated results and exact solutions of the illustrated examples shows the applicability of the proposed method in estimating spatially- and temperature-dependent thermal conductivity in inverse heat conduction problem.     

Solutions to an inverse monic quadratic eigenvalue problem

Given n+1 pairs of complex numbers and vectors (closed under complex conjugation), the inverse quadratic eigenvalue problem is to construct real symmetric or anti-symmetric matrix C and real symmetric matrix K of size n×n so that the quadratic pencil Q(λ)=λ²I_n+λC+K has the given n+1 pairs as eigenpairs. Necessary and sufficient conditions under which this quadratic inverse eigenvalue problem is solvable are obtained. Numerical algorithms for solving the problem are developed. Numerical examples illustrating these solutions are presented.     

On the spectral stability in subspaces for difference schemes with nonlocal boundary conditions

We consider an initial-boundary value problem for the heat equation with nonlocal boundary conditions containing a parameter γ > 1. The spectrum of the main differential operator contains some number (depending on γ) of eigenvalues lying in the left complex half-plane, which results in the instability of the problem with respect to the initial data. For difference schemes approximating the original problem, we obtain a criterion for stability in the subspaces generated by stable harmonics.     

Analyzing quadratic unconstrained binary optimization problems via multicommodity flows

Quadratic Unconstrained Binary Optimization (QUBO) problems concern the minimization of quadratic polynomials in n{0,1}-valued variables. These problems are NP-complete, but prior work has identified a sequence of polynomial-time computable lower bounds on the minimum value, denoted by C₂,C₃,C₄,…. It is known that C₂ can be computed by solving a maximum flow problem, whereas the only previously known algorithms for computing require solving a linear program. In this paper we prove that C₃ can be computed by solving a maximum multicommodity flow problem in a graph constructed from the quadratic function. In addition to providing a lower bound on the minimum value of the quadratic function on {0,1}ⁿ, this multicommodity flow problem also provides some information about the coordinates of the point where this minimum is achieved. By looking at the edges that are never saturated in any maximum multicommodity flow, we can identify relational persistencies: pairs of variables that must have the same or different values in any minimizing assignment. We furthermore show that all of these persistencies can be detected by solving single-commodity flow problems in the same network.     

Semiconductor final test scheduling with Sarsa(λ, k) algorithm

Semiconductor test scheduling problem is a variation of reentrant unrelated parallel machine problems considering multiple resource constraints, intricate {product, tester, kit, enabler assembly} eligibility constraints, sequence-dependant setup times, etc. A multi-step reinforcement learning (RL) algorithm called Sarsa(λ, k) is proposed and applied to deal with the scheduling problem with throughput related objective. Allowing enabler reconfiguration, the production capacity of the test facility is expanded and scheduling optimization is performed at the bottom level. Two forms of Sarsa(λ, k), i.e. forward view Sarsa(λ, k) and backward view Sarsa(λ, k), are constructed and proved equivalent in off-line updating. The upper bound of the error of the action-value function in tabular Sarsa(λ, k) is provided when solving deterministic problems. In order to apply Sarsa(λ, k), the scheduling problem is transformed into an RL problem by representing states, constructing actions, the reward function and the function approximator. Sarsa(λ, k) achieves smaller mean scheduling objective value than the Industrial Method (IM) by 68.59% and 76.89%, respectively for real industrial problems and randomly generated test problems. Computational experiments show that Sarsa(λ, k) outperforms IM and any individual action constructed with the heuristics derived from the existing heuristics or scheduling rules.     

A solution of the affine quadratic inverse eigenvalue problem

The quadratic inverse eigenvalue problem (QIEP) is to find the three matrices M,C, and K, given a set of numbers, closed under complex conjugations, such that these numbers become the eigenvalues of the quadratic pencil P(λ)=λ²M+λC+K. The affine inverse quadratic eigenvalue problem (AQIEP) is the QIEP with an additional constraint that the coefficient matrices belong to an affine family, that is, these matrices are linear combinations of substructured matrices. An affine family of matrices very often arise in vibration engineering modeling and analysis. Research on QIEP and AQIEP are still at developing stage. In this paper, we propose three methods and the associated mathematical theories for solving AQIEP: A Newton method, an alternating projections method, and a hybrid method combining the two. Validity of these methods are illustrated with results on numerical experiments on a spring-mass problem and comparisons are made with these three methods amongst themselves and with another Newton method developed by Elhay and Ram (2002) [12]. The results of our experiments show that the hybrid method takes much smaller number of iterations and converges faster than any of these methods.     

Inexact inverse subspace iteration for generalized eigenvalue problems

n this paper, we present an inexact inverse subspace iteration method for computing a few eigenpairs of the generalized eigenvalue problem Ax=λBx. We first formulate a version of inexact inverse subspace iteration in which the approximation from one step is used as an initial approximation for the next step. We then analyze the convergence property, which relates the accuracy in the inner iteration to the convergence rate of the outer iteration. In particular, the linear convergence property of the inverse subspace iteration is preserved. Numerical examples are given to demonstrate the theoretical results.     

The Brezis-Nirenberg problem near criticality in dimension 3

We consider the problem of finding positive solutions of Δu+λu+u^q=0 in a bounded, smooth domain Ω in , under zero Dirichlet boundary conditions. Here q is a number close to the critical exponent 5 and 0<λ<λ₁. We analyze the role of Green's function of Δ+λ in the presence of solutions exhibiting single and multiple bubbling behavior at one point of the domain when either q or λ are regarded as parameters. As a special case of our results, we find that if , where λ∗ is the Brezis-Nirenberg number, i.e., the smallest value of λ for which least energy solutions for q=5 exist, then this problem is solvable if q>5 and q−5 is sufficiently small.     

On a class of problems of determining the temperature and density of heat sources given initial and final temperature

We consider a class of problems modeling the process of determining the temperature and density of heat sources given initial and finite temperature. Their mathematical statements involve inverse problems for the heat equation in which, solving the equation, we have to find the unknown right-hand side depending only on the space variable. We prove the existence and uniqueness of classical solutions to the problem, solving the problem independently of whether the corresponding spectral problem (for the operator of multiple differentiation with not strongly regular boundary conditions) has a basis of generalized eigenfunctions.     

Numerical solution of forward and backward problem for 2-D heat conduction equation

For a two-dimensional heat conduction problem, we consider its initial boundary value problem and the related inverse problem of determining the initial temperature distribution from transient temperature measurements. The conditional stability for this inverse problem and the error analysis for the Tikhonov regularization are presented. An implicit inversion method, which is based on the regularization technique and the successive over-relaxation (SOR) iteration process, is established. Due to the explicit difference scheme for a direct heat problem developed in this paper, the inversion process is very efficient, while the application of SOR technique makes our inversion convergent rapidly. Numerical results illustrating our method are also given.     

Numerical solution of the problem of optimal control of the heating of a thermoelastic plate by internal heat sources

We give the statement and numerical solution of the problem of optimal control (in the sense of rapidity of response) of the heating of an unbounded plate by internal heat sources in the presence of restrictions on the maximal (in absolute value) thermal stresses. In constructing the solution of this nonlinear optimal control problem we use the method of the inverse heat conduction problem.     

A global in time existence and uniqueness result for an integrodifferential hyperbolic inverse problem with memory effect

We consider an inverse problem for a one-dimensional integrodifferential hyperbolic system, which comes from a simplified model of thermoelasticity. This inverse problem aims to identify the displacement u, the temperature η and the memory kernel k simultaneously from the weighted measurement data of temperature. By using the fixed point theorem in suitable Sobolev spaces, the global in time existence and uniqueness results of this inverse problem are obtained. Moreover, we prove that the solution to this inverse problem depends continuously on the noisy data in suitable Sobolev spaces. For this nonlinear inverse problem, our theoretical results guarantee the solvability for the proposed physical model and the well-posedness for small measurement time τ, which is quite different from general inverse problems.     

Optimization of the heating of a heat-sensitive layer under constraints on the stresses in the plastic region of deformation of the material

We study the problem of optimal control for rapidity of the heating of a heat-sensitive layer under constraints on the control (the temperature of the heating medium or the heat flux) and maximal values of the stress intensity in the plastic region of deformation of the material. We propose an algorithm for solving the problem that presumes it has been reduced to the inverse problem of thermoplasticity. For the case of one-sided heating we give a numerical analysis of the direct and inverse problems of thermoplasticity. Translated fromMatematichni Metody i Fiziko-Mekhanichni Polya, Vol. 38, 1995.     

The method of external excitation for solving generalized Sturm-Liouville problems

A new numerical technique for solving the generalized Sturm-Liouville problem , b_l[w(0),λ]=b_r[w(1),λ]=0 is presented. In particular, we consider the problems when the coefficient q(x,λ) or the boundary conditions depend on the spectral parameter λ in an arbitrary nonlinear manner. The method presented is based on mathematically modelling the physical response of a system to excitation over a range of frequencies. The response amplitudes are then used to determine the eigenvalues.The results of the numerical experiments justifying the method are presented.     

A projection-based stabilized finite element method for steady-state natural convection problem

We formulate a projection-based stabilization finite element technique for solving steady-state natural convection problems. In particular, we consider heat transport through combined solid and fluid media. This stabilization does not act on the large flow structures. Based on the projection stabilization idea, finite element error analysis of the problem is investigated and optimal errors for the velocity, temperature and pressure are established. We also present some numerical tests which both verify the theoretical predictions and demonstrate the method?s promise.     

Direct and inverse problems of gas emission and the sorptive deformation of coal beds

Using the equations of state for fractured-porous media that describe the sorptioninduced deformation of coal, we develop a geomechanical model for radial gas influx to a borehole drilled in a coal bed with the concurrent evolution of stress field in the borehole environment. A numerical-and-analytical method is proposed for solving the corresponding system of equations for poroelastic media. A relation is found between the volume of slack withdrawn in the borehole (when opening up the gas-bearing seams), the sorption-and-storage capacities of coal, the permeability k, and the horizontal component σ _h of the natural stress field. We demonstrate the solvability of the inverse boundary-coefficient problem of determining k and σ _h on the basis of pressure in the closed borehole. We substantiate an express-method for estimating the permeability by the measurements of pressure in the borehole operating in the “pressure drop” mode.