Topology Optimization for Dynamic Scaling Application using a

Gradient-based Optimization Approach

Beatriz Filipa Lopes Rebelo da Costa
beatriz.rebelo.da.costa@tecnico.ulisboa.pt

Instituto Superior Técnico, Universidade de Lisboa, Portugal

December 2019

Abstract
In recent years, topology optimization has received considerable attention from the research com-
munity the design of lightweight airframe structures.
In this thesis, topology optimization has been used for designing a lifting surface for a small scaled
model taking into account the timely new developments in addititive manufacturing. The design op-
timization aims to produce a scaled model with similar dynamic behavior as the full scaled model
meaning that the eigenvalues and corresponding eigenvectors for the full scaled and the scaled model
present similar dynamic characteristics.
The optimization algorithm based on the Solid Isotropic Material with Penalization (SIMP) method
was chosen to distribute material in the scaled model. The influence of critical parameters related to
SIMP such as the penalization factor and the use of a filter have been investigated.
First, a single-material topology optimization is implemented, followed by a multi-material topology
optimization to increase the design optimization space. To ensure a reasonably fast optimization process,
the sequential approximate optimization algorithm is used. The topology optimization process was
carried out using Matlab, while the finite element analysis was solved using the Abaqus software.
Keywords: Topology Optimization, Solid Isotropic Material with Penalization, Dynamic
scaling, Modal Assurance Criterion, Eigenvalues, Sequential Approximate Optimization.
Keywords: Topology Optimization, Solid Isotropic Material with Penalization, Dynamic scaling,
Eigenvalues, Modal Assurance Criterion, Sequential Approximate Optimization.

1. Introduction dynamic scaling has been carried out, which is de-

scribed in [1].
Since the earliest days of flight, humans were
fascinated with aircraft models. Within the sci- The chosen approach to dynamically scale was
entific community, early aviation pioneers, such as through Topology Optimization (TO) . TO aims
Leonardo da Vinci and the Wright brothers, often to find the best material layout within a design do-
used aircraft models to improve their knowledge in main to minimize/maximize an objective while sub-
aircraft and to develop them. This fascination was jected to a set of constraints and boundary condi-
also motivated by the need of physical experiment- tions. This method is built on repeated analysis and
ing in the engineering field, with the purpose of design update steps, often guided by gradient com-
validating that aircraft models. Another encour- putation. It has been used and developed within
agement, is the urgency to balance the costs of the the engineering domain since 1988, [2]. The design
aircraft production. Being wary of these two fac- domain is discretized into finite elements and the
tors, the idea of using scaled models that would optimizer determines which elements should con-
have the same dynamic behaviour as the full scale tain material and which should be void. Despite
ones arose. being widely used in the field of structural optimiza-
tion, there are some numerical instabilities associ-
The dynamic properties of a mechanical structure
ated to topology optimization such as checkerboard
are theoretically characterized by its eigenfrequen-
patterns and mesh dependencies, [3].
cies and their corresponding eigenmodes. There-
fore, if the scaled model presents the same eigen- In the field of TO, one of the most commonly
frequencies and eigenmodes as the full scale model, used method is the Solid Isotropic Material with
they have the same dynamic functions. In the Lan- Penalization (SIMP), [4], which will be the chosen
gley Research center of NASA, much work in the approach in this research.

1
 Since 1993, dynamic problems have been ad-
dressed with TO. Methods for tunning of simple
eigenvalues/eigenfrequencies in shape and sizing de-
sign problems are well established and can be im-
plemented directly in TO, [5], [6], [7] and [8].
However, it is often found that, although being
simple in the beginning of the iterative design pro-
cedure, later the eigenfrequencies may become mul-
tiple because of the coincidence of these eigenfre-
quency with one or more adjacent eigenfrequencies.
To avoid this, instead of only maximizing these
eigenfrequencies, in [9], Jianbin Du et al. proposed
to maximize the gap between two consecutive eigen-
frequencies.
Generally, topology optimization methods work
in traditional manufacturing processes such as cast-
ing and machining. However, these processes have
some manufacturing limitations during the design
stage to ensure a doable design. Combining Topol-
ogy Optimization and Additive Manufacturing may
be the solution.
In the past years, Additive Manufacturing has
been deeply explored. Nowadays one of its appli-
cations is to manufacture wings of scaled models.
Comparing to the traditional manufacturing meth-
ods, which require a high degree of supply chain
management and large work force or machinery, Ad-
ditive Manufacturing does not require molds, forms
or machining, without compromising the complex-
ity of the model. The final product is able to present
great structural loads at lower masses. In this in-
dustry, several materials such as metals, ceramics,
polymers and biomaterials are possible to use. Due
to the cheap price and simple fabrication, polymers
are the most used materials for AM. Hence, AM is
more economically viable for small scale production.
[10]
In the SIMP method, intermediate densities
are penalized to ensure discrete void-solid designs.
With Additive Manufacturing it is possible to re-
place the intermediate densities with structures or
different materials.
Following this reasoning, it makes sense to im-
plement a Multi-Material Topology Optimization.
This technology would result in a final design with
more freedom and consequently potentially better
solutions.
Multi-Material Topology Optimization is an area
of active research. In [11], it was considered a typ-
ical SIMP problem but with three material phases:
one void and two solid.A similar approach to SIMP
that allows more than one material phase is Dis-
crete Material Optimization (DMO), in the design
of laminate composite structures, [12].
In this work, a strategy to tailor dynamic prop-
erties through a topology optimization method is
proposed in a wing box, with AM potentialities. In
2
order to achieve this, a computational framework
is developed, where an interface is established be-
tween Matlab and the chosen Finite Element soft-
ware, Abaqus. First a single-material topology opti-
mization is done. In a more advance phase, a Multi-
Material Topology Optimization is carried out.
2. Background
2.1. Topology Optimization
Starting with an initial design, the material dis-
tribution will be updated until the final configura-
tion is obtained. The material distribution is de-
scribed by the density variable, x, which can either
take the value 0 (void) or 1 (solid material) at any
point in the design. These variables are used as the
design variables for the optimization problem.
The optimization problem can then be stated as:
 R
minx : f = f (u(x), x) = Ω f (u(x), x)dV

w.r.t. : 0 ≤ x ≤ 1 (1)

s.t. : gi (u(x), x) ≤ 0, i = 1, ...m

where f is the objective function to minimize, gi
are constraints, m is the number of constraints and
the state field u satisfies a linear or non-linear state
equation. x stands for the design variable, which
represents the proportion of solid material in the
element, [13].
2.1.1 Solid Isotropic Material with Penaliza-
tion(SIMP)
The goal of the optimization process is to obtain a
close-to solid or void design since it would be physi-
cally impossible to produce or to find materials with
the intermediate properties that correspond to the
grey areas. In order to prevent these intermediate
densities, the SIMP method was first introduced by
Bendsoe in 1989 , [4].
In this approach, the relation between the design
variable, which represents the proportion of solid
material, and material property, E, is given by the
power law:
E(xi ) = xpe
i E0 , (2)
where pe is the penalization factor and E0 is the
Young’s modulus of the solid material. xi repre-
sents the proportion of material of a generic element
i. The penalization factor inhibits the formation of
regions with intermediate partial density.
2.1.2 Rational Approximation of Material Proper-
ties (RAMP)
Very similar to the SIMP method, the RAMP
(Rational Approximation of Material Properties),
was introduced by Stolpe and Svanberg, [14], stated
as:
 xi ( xp
E(xi ) = E0 (3) wpE (xp ) = 1+pe(1−xp )
1 + pe(1 − xi ) (6)
wpρ = xpe
p
The main difference between SIMP and RAMP
is that the last one has a non-zero gradient when where xp is the design variable corresponding to
xi = 0, which influences the convergence properties. the pth patch that can vary continuously between 0
One should be careful when choosing the penal- and 1, representing void and solid respectively and
ization factor, pe, since it must be non-unique and pe is the penalization factor.
because it highly depends on the physical problem
3.1. Optimization Strategy
in question.
Due to the complexity of the problem in ques-
2.2. Dynamic Scaling tion and to the big amount of design variables, one
There is a great deal of interest in scale-model must ensure a reasonably fast optimization. To
testing. Although designers employ strong analysis achieve this, a Sequential Approximate Optimiza-
tools, testing will always be required to ensure the tion (SAO) was implemented.
proper functioning of the system. Due to this, using The SAO technique, in summary builds compu-
scaled models is a great option that reduces costs tationally inexpensive approximations for the ob-
and time. jective and constraint functions, through a small
The importance of dynamic scaled models in the number of simulation iterations, in a sub-region of
aerospace engineering field can be found in [15]. the entire design domain. The sub-regions are de-
The Modal Assurance Criterion (MAC) proved to fined by moving limits, which are defined based on
be an efficient method to know the degree of correla- the Moving Methods Asymptotes, [18].
tion between two mode shapes. These last represent The approximate sub-problem at the k th itera-
the displacement of the elements of a structure for tion is expressed as:
a given frequency.
MAC is calculated as the normalized scalar prod-
min:fˆ0k (x)
uct of the two sets of vectors:
 w.r.t. : x
k
ĝ
 j
 (x) = 0, j = 1, ..., l (7)
| (ΦTA )(ΦX ) |2 k
subject to : ĥj (x) ≤ 0, j = 1, ..., m
M AC(ΦA , ϕX ) = (4)
((ΦA )(ΦA ))((ΦTX )(ΦX ))
T 
 k
αi ≤ xi ≤ βik , i = 1, ..., n
where ΦA and ΦX are the two mode shape vectors
being compared. where fˆ0k (x) stands for the approximated function
MAC is bounded between 0 and 1. If the MAC of the original objective function, f0 (x), submitted
value is 0 means that the compared vectors are or- to the approximated constraint functions ĝj (x) and
thogonal and if it is 1 means that it reached the ĥj (x) . l is the number of equality constraints and
maximum similitude. Chih-Chun Cheng et al., [16], m is the total number of inequality constraints, n
added MAC as a constraint in the optimization is the number of design variables, x is the vector of
to obtain the desired modes, where MAC must be the design variables and αik and βik are the move
higher than a defined value. According to [17], this limits.
value should be 0.9 since it indicates consistent cor- The choice of these move limits will have a direct
respondence. impact on the accuracy of the solution as well as
on the computation time. The bigger the number
3. Implementation of sub-regions, the more accurate are the obtained
Adapting the SIMP and RAMP method to the results but it also requires a higher amount of com-
best needs of this research, the formulation of the putation time.
constitutive matrix Ep and the mass density ρp of Now that the problem has been discretized in
pth patch are given as: sub-problems, one must choose an optimizer, since
( Topology Optimization problems are examples of
Ep = E0 + wpE (Es − E0 ) ∀p large-scale nonlinear optimization problems. The
(5)
ρp = ρ0 + wpρ (ρs − ρ0 ) ∀p chosen method was IPOPT, which is an implemen-
tation of the interior point line search filter method.
where E0 is a low stiffness material, Es the stiffness More information regarding this solver can be found
of the solid material, ρ0 represents a low mass den- in [19].
sity (corresponding to the void phase) and ρs the
mass density of the solid material. wpρ and wpE are 3.2. Computational Framework
the weight functions. In order to combine the topology optimization
The weight functions are defined by: methodology for dynamic scaling with the finite el-

3
ement analysis, a computational framework was de-
veloped in Matlab. The finite element analysis are
done in Abaqus which is called by means of cus-
tomized Python scripts to make the process easier
and more autonomous.
The flowchart of this framework is presented in
Figure 1.
optimization processes.
The loop of the topology optimization starts with
the pre-processing. In this step, the matrixes of
mass and stiffness of the scaled model are obtained.
Afterwards, the calculation of the derivatives is
done.
The finite element formulation of the eigenvalue
problem is defined as:

(K − ωs2 M )Φs = 0 ∀s = 1, ...nf , (8)

where K and M stand for the stiffness and mass

global matrices. The number of degrees of freedom
is represented by nf . In the above equation, the
eigenfrequencies, ωs = ω1 , ..., ωnf , have the corre-
sponding eigenvectors, Φs = Φ1 , ..., Φnf .
The sensitivities are required for the optimizer
to update the design variables during the optimiza-
tion process. The necessary derivatives were then
calculated.
To calculate the derivatives of the eigenfrequen-
cies, one must explore equation 8 and rearrange it.
In the end, the following equation can be obtained:

∂ωs2 (x)
 
∂K(x) ∂M (x)
= ΦTs − ωs2 Φs (9)
∂x ∂x ∂x
The derivatives of ωs2 (x) will be necessary for the
Figure 1: Computational framework for the Topol- minimization of the objective function in the opti-
ogy Optimization integrated with commercial finite mization solver.
element software.
3.4. Objective Function
An objective function represents the main aim of
The Matlab code was written to work alongside the optimization. Consequently, in this research,
the Computer Aided Engineering (CAE) software, the objective function will be designed to penalize
Abaqus. First, the user must define the parameters the difference between the eigenvalues of the scaled
used for the optimization process, such as the ma- model and the full scaled ones.
terial properties of the models and the dimensions. The objective function that resulted in a
In order to start the optimization, an initial de- smoother function was the following:
sign must be given. Hence, the initial value of the
design variable, xp , in equation (6), is 0.5. Like N  2
X ωn2 SC
so, the proportion of void and solid elements is the 1 − (10)
ωn2 T arget
same. The starting points in IPOPT are always ini- n=1
tialized in between the lower and upper bounds of where ωn2 SC stands for the eigenvalues of the
the density variables, i.e. 0.5. Other starting points scaled model, ωn2 T arget stands for the target eigen-
could be less suitable when using interior point al- values, which are the direct scaled eigenvalues of
gorithms such as the IPOPT. the full scaled model, and N the number of natural
For each iteration, the dynamic behaviour of the frequencies.
full scaled model will be compared to the dynamic Since dynamic scaling is implemented, ωnT arget is
behavior of the scaled model, using the MAC (equa- defined as:
tion 4). The design of the scaled model will be
updated after each iteration until its dynamic be- ωnT arget = 2πfF ullScaleM odel × λ, (11)
havior, i.e. its eigenfrequencies, converges with the where the scale factor λ is a constant of proportion-
ones from the full scaled model through a gradient ality to ensure the geometric similitude, defined as:
based optimization.

3.3. Preprocessing and sensitivity analysis Magnitude of variable in scaled model

λ=
As already depicted in the flowchart of Figure 1, Magnitude of variable in full scaled model
Sensitivity Analysis plays an important role in the (12)

4
4. Results
Two types of topology optimization were per-
formed. First, a single material wing box is in-
troduced. This is helpful to better understand the
computational model and to also understand the in-
fluence of the penalization factor and the use of a
filter.
Secondly, a multi-material optimization wing box
is also presented.
The wing box that is optimized represents a
generic fighter-inspired wing-box, and the dimen-
sions were based on the maximum build size for the
Stratasys Object500 Connex3 polyjet printer, [20].
In Figure 2, one can see the wing-box represented,
built-in at the root.
Figure 2: Wing box represented with the boundary
conditions.
In this study, the scale factor in equation 12, λ
is 1/10 which means that every geometry length in
the full-scale model is 10 times bigger than in the
small-scale one. The dimensions of the model are
shown in Figure 3.
Figure 3: Case Study: Wing-box with its dimen-
sions in cm in the Abaqus software.
4.1. Single Material Topology Optimization
The candidate material for the scaled model was
chosen based on the 3D printer manufacturer op-
tions that can be found in [21]. The chosen mate- Figure 5: Case Study: Wing box with its nodes set.
rial is a rigid photopolymer that showed accurate
results for static and modal responses in a previ-
ous study, [22]. For the full-scale model, the chosen picted in Figure 1. In this case, for the optimizer
material was aluminium.
The material properties of the full-scale model
and the scaled one can be found in Table 1.
E (GPa) ν ρ (kg/m3 )
Aluminum 60 0.33 2400
Photopolymer 2.76 0.3 1177
Table 1: Material Properties of the full-scale model
and scaled model: elastic modulus, Poisson ratio
and density.
The scaled model was first generated using a
python script. This model is simulated in the FE
software Abaqus, that will follow the computational
framework explained in Figure 1.
The wing-box is an assembly of three parts, two
shell plates and one solid plate, as illustrated in
Figure 4. One shell part is assembled in the top of
the solid part while the other is fixed on the bottom.
Figure 4: Wing-box: 2 shell plates and the solid in
the middle in the Abaqus software surface.
In order to avoid the formation of checkerboard
patterns, the solid part of the wing box was dis-
cretized in patches, [3].
Only the solid part was discretized in patches,
once only this one will be optimized. A mesh with
10 rows, 8 layers and 20 columns in the x-axis,
y-axis and z-axis, respectively,was defined, which
makes a total of 1600 patches.
To obtain the eigenmodes that will be needed for
the MAC calculation, nodes had to be set. Sixty
nodes were set, as shown in Figure 5.
The optimization will follow the flowchart de-
solver, IPOPT, there are no constraints and the
5
only parameters given to the solver are the objective
Objective Function
1.08

1.06

function, the gradient of the objective function and 1.04

Objective Function Value

the bounds of the sub-problems that were defined 1.02

in section 3.1. 1

0.98

0.96
0 50 100 150
Iteration

4.1.1 Influence of the penalization factor

Figure 8: Objective function, filter off,
The results of the optimization will be presented
pe=1.
in this subsection. In order to compare the influence Objective Function
1.25

of the penalization factor, two optimizations were 1.2

done. One with the penalization factor set to one 1.15

Objective Function Value

and the other with penalization factor set to three. 1.1

1.05

The MAC number is determined, at first, for 1

eight frequencies of each of the models, scaled and 0.95

0 50
Iteration
100 150

full, and only afterwards is sorted to have the five

desired ones, corresponding to the first five frequen- Figure 9: Objective function, filter off,
cies of the full scale model and the five frequencies pe=3.
of the scaled model which eigenmodes best match
the eigenmodes of the full scale. In Figures 6 and 7, 0.65

the sorted MAC values for the five frequencies are 0.6

0.55

represented when the penalization factor is 1 and 0.5

Mass value
when it is 3, in the 150th iteration. 0.45

0.4

0.35

0.3
0 50 100 150
Iteration

Figure 10: Mass variation, filter off, pe=1.

0.7

0.65

0.6

0.55

0.5
Mass value

0.45

0.4

0.35

Figure 6: Sorted MAC for 5 frequencies, 0.3

0.25

when pe=1, 150th iteration, filter off. 0.2

0 50
Iteration
100 150

Figure 11: Mass variation, filter off, pe=3.

of the patch i and ρ is the density of the material,

Figure 7: Sorted MAC for 5 frequencies,
when pe=3, 150th iteration, filter off.
Comparing the results obtained and observing
the progress of the objective functions along the
iterations of the optimization, Figures 8 and 9, it
is possible to conclude that the objective functions
are converged and therefore the optimizations are
concluded.
The variation of the total mass for each case are
now computed, Figures 10 and 11. The total mass
is given by:
n
X which is the primary reason for using penalizations
mass = wi V olP atchi ρ, (13)
i=1
where n is the number of patches, in this case
1600, wi is the weight value that represents the rel-
ative density of each patch, V olP atchi the volume
established in table 1.
As expected, the values of the total mass for the
cases where the penalization factor is the same,
present the same initial value. Also, a higher pe-
nalization factor was observed to lead to a higher
value of the total mass.
The topology of the eight layers, for the two dif-
ferent penalization factors, can be checked in Figure
12.
One can conclude that with the penalization fac-
tor equal to 1, there are more grey areas and inter-
mediate densities against a more black and white
topology when the penalization factor is 3. This
is also due to the fact that the exponential factor
pushes the variables to the boundaries, void or solid,
higher than 1. However, some checkerboard pat-
terns can be observed. Checkerboard patterns are
the formation of alternating solid and void elements
ordered in a checkerboard like pattern as it can be
observed in Figure 12. For this reason, different

6
 filters were employed.

4.1.2 Influence of a filter

The reason for the existence of checkerboards, is
that instead of treating the structure as a whole,
the optimizer solver deals with each patch individ-
ually. This results in one patch having the max-
imum relative density and the patch in the direct
neighbourhood having the minimum. To avoid this,
a density filter and sensitivity filter are used. The
density filter is applied in the weight function and
the sensitivity filter is applied after the derivatives
(equation 9) are calculated. The density and sensi-
tivity filters are based on filters proposed in [23] and
in [24]. The radius, rmin , limits the elements that
belong to the neighbourhood of each patch, these
elements will influence the density of each patch
when the filter is applied. In this study, it was set
to 1.5.
The topology of the eight layers can be seen in
Figure 13 when the penalization factor is equal to
3. Unlike what happened in Figure 12, in this case
there are no checkerboard patterns, which was the
main goal of using a filter.

Figure 12: Eight layers’ topology at the 150th iter- Figure 13: Eight layers’ topology at the 150th iter-
ation.On the left when pe=3 and on the right when ation, when pe=3, filter on, rmin = 1.5.
pe=1 when filter is off.

4.2. Multi-Material Topology Optimization

In the Multi-Material Topology Optimization
(MMTO), instead of only having one candidate ma-
terial, now there can be several material phases. To
achieve this, some changes had to be done in the
Matlab code. One of the main differences is in the

7
pre-processing. Instead of obtaining the stiffness the dominant phase. Near the root, the patches are
and mass matrixes for only one material, now it is mainly formed by the second material. Closer to the
required to obtain the matrixes for each material tip there is a series of patches where the second ma-
phase. This will have a direct consequence in the terial is the most evident. Finally, near the tip the
computation time, which will substantially increase. patches are mainly formed by the void phase. The
Based on the Discrete Material Optimization, the first candidate Material can be seen as an interme-
equation that gives the material properties of each diate solution between nickel alloy (the phase with
patch is now [25]: greater stiffness and density) and the void phase.
PN W Some checkerboard-patterns can be observed, which
Ep = j=1 wjE Ej could be solved with a filter.
PN W
ρp = j=1 wjρ ρj (14)
PN W
νp = j=1 wjE νj ,

where the weight functions are still the ones defined

by equation 6. N W stands for the number of ma-
terial phases.
In this research, the number of material phases
chosen was three: two solid and one void.
The influence of the choice of the materials was
studied.
Firstly, a optimization with two polymers to re-
spect the printer’s specifications was addressed.
However, despite having chosen the most different
materials available for the printer in use, the solid
candidate materials are still very similar to one an-
other. Due to this, instead of MMTO, the optimizer
only chooses between the first candidate material
and void, and the final result is similar to the one
obtained in the single-material topology optimiza-
tion.
In order to have validated results for the MMTO,
different materials were searched for. First, an op-
timization with a Titanium alloy and a polymer Figure 14: Eight layers’ topology when pe=3. Ma-
was done. Although showing already some patches terial 1 is a titanium alloy and Material 2 is a nickel
where the polymer was predominant, the topology alloy.
was mainly titanium and in the tip there was void.
Finally, an optimization with two metal alloys
was made, the second candidate material was a 5. Concluding Remarks
Nickel alloy, while the first material remained Ti- Even though TO has been employed and devel-
tanium. In Table 2, the candidate materials can be oped over the last three decades, there is still space
found. for improvements and new applications can be ex-
plored. An example of this is the combination of
E (GPa) ν ρ (kg/m3 ) dynamic scaling and TO. The main research goal of
Aluminum 60 0.33 2400 this dissertation was to find the best material distri-
Material 1 115 0.3 4441 bution for a scaled model to have the same dynamic
Material 2 165 0.3 8200 behaviour as the full-scale one, to be 3D printed in
Void 1 × 10−9 0.3 10 the future. In this research, the chosen case study
was a wing-box, but the code can work with differ-
Table 2: Material Properties with elastic modulus, ent geometries and mesh refinements, which opens
Poisson ratio and density. several research opportunities in the aerospace en-
gineering field.
Finally, the topology of the eight layers is repre- Despite being worldwide used, TO problems of-
sented in Figure 14. It can be observed that the ten present certain numerical instabilities, such
candidate material 2 is more present than the other as checkerboard-patterns. For this reason, den-
material phases, which is the one with the highest sity and sensitivity filters were implemented along-
value of stiffness and density. From the root to the side the single-material topology optimization. No
tip of the wing it can be observed transitions in checkerboard-patterns were found, after the imple-

8
mentation of the filters. [6] Z. Ma, Noboru Kikuchi, and Ichiro Hagiwara.
A Multi-Material Topology Optimization was Structural topology and shape optimization for
also performed successfully. This optimization gives a frequency response problem. Computational
more flexibility and freedom in the design phase, Mechanics, 13, 12 1993.
which results in a better solution, proved by a
lower objective function. The objective function in [7] N.L. Pedersen. Maximization of eigenvalues us-
this work was defined as the difference between the ing topology optimization. Structural and Mul-
eigenfrequencies of the scaled-model and the eigen- tidisciplinary Optimization, 20:2–11, 01 2000.
frequencies of the full-scale model.
[8] P.H. Nakasone and E.C.N. Silva. Dynamic de-
The implementation of the optimization resulted
sign of piezoelectric laminated sensors and ac-
in a valuable tool for the design phase of aerospace
tuators using topology optimization. Journal
structures. However, there are still some improve-
of Intelligent Material Systems and Structures,
ments that can be done, such as adding an inequal-
21:1627–1652, 11 2010.
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greater to 0.9; adding another objective function, [9] Jianbin Du and N. Olhoff. Topological design
where the gap between two consecutive eigenfre- of freely vibrating continuum structures for
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results. [10] Yoram Mass and Oded Amir. Topology opti-
For future work, the final topologies should be mization for additive manufacturing: Account-
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wind tunnel tests. Optimization: Theory, Method and Applica-
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