Proc, Indian Acad. Sci. (Engg. Sci) Vol. 3, Pt. 3, November 1980, pp. 199-210 © Printed in India. Some trends in structural design PN MURTHY . Department of Aeronautical Engineering, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore 560 012 Brutal aidrte” Department of Asconantical Exgleerog, Indian oatitute of Teeh- nology, Kanpur 208 O16, MS received 19 Jusy 1980 ‘Abstract. The last decade has been one of intense research activity in optimal struc- {ural layouts, materials and techniques of optimisation, Tn this paper tis activity is reviewed around the concept of ideal design proposed in 1968 and the trends are traced to show that the structural designer is moving towards an articulated, eybernetic structure similar to human skeleton. Keywords. Optimisation; optimal layout; structural design; ideal design; synthesis; materials, 1, Introduction The concept of perfect design (referred to hereafter as ideal design) had been proposed by Rao & Murthy (1968) (hereinafter referred to as RM) as a logical convergence of the efforts of a structural designer in his ‘ purposeful activity directed toward a goal of fulfilling human needs particularly those which can be met by technological factors of our culture ’ (Asimov 1962), where the purposeful activity is the design of structure. Sharpening the activity further, structural design can be defined as: ‘Given a physical situation or a set of situations which determine the functional needs, loading patterns and environmental conditions, to design a structure which fulfils the social needs and can withstand the effects of loads and environment, within a given set of economic, social and technological constraints’ (Rao & Murthy 1968). One can, therefore, observe from the above definition that structural design is 4 cost-configuration-material synthesis for a given set of loads, configuration to meet the functional needs and provide the framework for the loads, material to give con- tent and capability to the configuration, and cost to reflect the economic and social constraints. The layout of the configuration is often dictated by the functional needs and composed out of basic structural elements whose response to loads is well understood. The loading pattern is a consequence of the functions and layout and is dictated by the mission profile and environment. Estimation of loads, however, is not an easy task in many cases, particularly so in cases like space missions where the environment is unfamiliar and load estimation involves extrapolation under uncertain conditions, Even in terrestrial missions, rarely are the loads deterministic, barring even gust and seismic loads which are primarily random. Thus the choice of design load is a matter of considerable research. 199