Reliability-Based Multidisciplinary Design Optimization under Correlated Uncertainties

Abstract

Complex mechanical system is usually composed of several subsystems, which are often coupled with each other. Reliability-based multidisciplinary design optimization (RBMDO) is an efficient method to design such complex system under uncertainties. However, the present RBMDO methods ignored the correlations between uncertainties. In this paper, through combining the ellipsoidal set theory and first-order reliability method (FORM) for multidisciplinary design optimization (MDO), characteristics of correlated uncertainties are investigated. Furthermore, to improve computational efficiency, the sequential optimization and reliability assessment (SORA) strategy is utilized to obtain the optimization result. Both a mathematical example and a case study of an engineering system are provided to illustrate the feasibility and validity of the proposed method.