TY - JOUR
T1 - Tensegrity topology optimization by force maximization on arbitrary ground structures
AU - Liu, Ke
AU - Paulino, Glaucio H.
N1 - Funding Information:
Funding information This study received support from the US NSF (National Science Foundation) through Grants 1538830 and 1321661. In addition, Ke Liu received support from the China Scholarship Council (CSC). We are grateful to the support provided by the Raymond Allen Jones Chair at the Georgia Institute of Technology.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2019, Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature.
PY - 2019/6/15
Y1 - 2019/6/15
N2 - This paper presents an optimization approach for design of tensegrity structures based on graph theory. The formulation obtains tensegrities from ground structures, through force maximization using mixed integer linear programming. The method seeks a topology of the tensegrity that is within a given geometry, which provides insight into the tensegrity design from a geometric point of view. Although not explicitly enforced, the tensegrities obtained using this approach tend to be both stable and symmetric. Borrowing ideas from computer graphics, we allow “restriction zones” (i.e., passive regions in which no geometric entity should intersect) to be specified in the underlying ground structure. Such feature allows the design of tensegrities for actual engineering applications, such as robotics, in which the volume of the payload needs to be protected. To demonstrate the effectiveness of our proposed design method, we show that it is effective at extracting both well-known tensegrities and new tensegrities from the ground structure network, some of which are prototyped with the aid of additive manufacturing.
AB - This paper presents an optimization approach for design of tensegrity structures based on graph theory. The formulation obtains tensegrities from ground structures, through force maximization using mixed integer linear programming. The method seeks a topology of the tensegrity that is within a given geometry, which provides insight into the tensegrity design from a geometric point of view. Although not explicitly enforced, the tensegrities obtained using this approach tend to be both stable and symmetric. Borrowing ideas from computer graphics, we allow “restriction zones” (i.e., passive regions in which no geometric entity should intersect) to be specified in the underlying ground structure. Such feature allows the design of tensegrities for actual engineering applications, such as robotics, in which the volume of the payload needs to be protected. To demonstrate the effectiveness of our proposed design method, we show that it is effective at extracting both well-known tensegrities and new tensegrities from the ground structure network, some of which are prototyped with the aid of additive manufacturing.
KW - Additive manufacturing
KW - Form-finding
KW - Graph theory
KW - Ground structure
KW - Tensegrity
KW - Topology optimization
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U2 - 10.1007/s00158-018-2172-3
DO - 10.1007/s00158-018-2172-3
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85060969472
SN - 1615-147X
VL - 59
SP - 2041
EP - 2062
JO - Structural and Multidisciplinary Optimization
JF - Structural and Multidisciplinary Optimization
IS - 6
ER -