STRUCTURAL OPTIMIZATION USING GRADIENT AND EVOLUTIONARY ALGORITHMS

Optimization can be defined as the automatic process to make a system or component as good as possible based on an objective function and subject to certain design constraints. There are many different methods or algorithms that can be used to optimize a structure Optimization is a technology for developing optimized structures considering design parameters like expected loads, available design space, materials and cost. Genetic algorithm is a natural selection search method intended to combine good solutions to a problem many generations to get best results. First generations elected randomly and then crossover and mutation is applied. All the chromosomes are represented individually by a binary string and hence it termed as a genetic algorithm. The gradient based method starts with the initial solution and each successive iteration converges to the optimal solution. This convergence depends on the selection of initial approximation. In this work, an attempt has been made to find out the optimal solutions for threebar truss problem, simply support beam and two more non-linear standard functions by using gradient and evolutionary algorithms.