Collaborative Research: HCC: Medium: Computational Design of Complex Fluidic Systems

Recent advances in digital fabrication and computational design optimization have created a new paradigm for how efficiently components of structures, vehicles and wearable devices can be imagined, prototyped and deployed. An additional opportunity for high-impact innovation stems from the plethora of devices incorporating both solid and fluid components that human engineers have traditionally crafted relying on experience and established designed practices; examples include jet engines, hydraulic pumps, filtration systems and medical implants such as heart valves and coronary stents, all of which rely on a delicate functional interaction between a solid, often elastic, structure and a fluid medium.

This project will leverage research momentum and experience from computational design optimization of purely solid, elastic structures (that have been the dominant focus of such techniques until now), to extend the reach of optimization-driven design to fluid- and flow-modulating mechanisms. Project outcomes will ultimately fuel innovation in energy efficiency, boost the functionality of soft robotic platforms, and enable the creation of next-generation microfluidic mechanisms including in highly effective prosthetics.

Additional broad impact for project outcomes will derive from the development of exciting new curricula at the host institutions, while the real-world appeal and applications will provide strong outreach opportunities to K-12 and community colleges that attract students to STEM careers.

This research focuses on a number of specific challenges associated with functional devices that incorporate fluidic components. Non-linearity of both the solid/compliant phase and the dynamics of the fluid flow is highly relevant to such design tasks and will be treated as an integral component of algorithmic exploration. Non-parametric design approaches that are free to create accurate geometric details and intricate topological features will be explored, and the design of dynamic systems that include periodic or chaotic motion or flow, in conjunction with transient contact/collision patterns, will be investigated.

The work will build on the PIs' prior products and expertise in delivering computational design frameworks that can handle tens or hundreds of millions of degrees of freedom, so that project outcomes can accommodate the specification of multiple design objectives stemming from multiple flow scenarios and/or multiple functional traits that contribute to the overall design. The research will develop methods and a scalable computational framework that jointly address these challenges, which is essential to delivering an effective and versatile design platform for fluidic mechanisms.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.