Reduced order modelling for efficient numerical optimisation of a hot-wall chemical vapour deposition reactor

Abstract

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to present a reduced order computational strategy for a multi-physics simulation involving a fluid flow, electromagnetism and heat transfer in a hot-wall chemical vapour deposition reactor. The main goal is to produce a multi-parametric solution for fast exploration of the design space to perform numerical prototyping and process optimisation. Design/methodology/approach Different reduced order techniques are applied. In particular, proper generalized decomposition is used to solve the parameterised heat transfer equation in a five-dimensional space. Findings The solution of the state problem is provided in a compact separated-variable format allowing a fast evaluation of the process-specific quantities of interest that are involved in the optimisation algorithm. This is completely decoupled from the solution of the underlying state problem. Therefore, once the whole parameterised solution is known, the evaluation of the objective function is done on-the-fly. Originality/value Reduced order modelling is applied to solve a multi-parametric multi-physics problem and generate a fast estimator needed for preliminary process optimisation. Different order reduction techniques are combined to treat the flow, heat transfer and electromagnetism problems in the framework of separated-variable representations.