The Multi-Objective Design of Laminated Structure with Non-Dominated Sorting Genetic Algorithm

Non-dominated sorting genetic algorithm has shown excellent advantages in solving complicated optimization problems with discrete variables in a variety of domains. In this paper, we implement a multi-objective genetic algorithm to guide the design of the laminated structure with two objectives: minimizing the mass and maximizing the strength of a specified structure simultaneously, classical lamination theory and failure theory are adopted to compute the strength of a laminate. The simulation results have shown that a non-dominated genetic algorithm has great advantages in the design of laminated composite material. Experiment results also suggest that optimal run times are from 16 to 32 for the design of glass-epoxy laminate with non-dominated sorting genetic algorithm. We also observed that two stages involve the optimization process in which the number of individuals in the first frontier first increases, and then decreases. These simulation results are helpful to decide the proper run times of genetic algorithms for glass-epoxy design and reduce computation costs.