Abstract :
An efficient direct differentiation method by continuum approach is presented for the
shape design sensitivity analysis of axisymmetric elastic solids. The method is purely based on the
axisymmetric boundary integral equation formulation. A new boundary integral equation for
sensitivity analysis is derived by taking material derivative to the same integral identity that was
used in the adjoint method. As sensitivities in terms of the shape design variables are directly
calculated by solving the new BIE, the singular boundary condition which may arise in the adjoint
method is avoided in the present direct method.
To validate the theoretical formulation, numerical implementation is done for three examples.
For a hollow disk and a thick-walled cylinder problem with analytic solution, the sensitivities by
present method are compared with analytic sensitivities. For an example of a spherical vessel, being
rather practical, the sensitivities are compared with those by finite differences. Copyright 0 1996
Elsevier Science Ltd
