AN IMPROVED SEMIANALYTICAL METHOD FOR SENSITIVITY ANALYSIS

The semi-analytical method is conveniently used to obtain design sensi tivities. However, it may have serious accuracy problems in shape desi gn. In this study, an improved semianalytical method is presented for the accurate computation of shape design sensitivities. The method is based on approximating the flexibility matrix by means of von Neumann series. In numerical examples, two cases for which the standard semian alytical method fails are considered. It is demonstrated that the sens itivities can be obtained very accurately by the improved method propo sed.