OPTIMUM STRUCTURAL DESIGN FOR NONLINEAR DYNAMIC RESPONSE BY THE INCREMENTAL TRANSFER MATRIX METHOD.

The purpose of this paper is to present the optimum structural design method for nonlinear dynamic response. Much of the work in dynamic structural optimization has been mainly concerned with the linear system, because the iteration procedures in both nonlinear analysis and the optimization might require a large scale computation effort and much computation time. To solve such difficulties, the incremental transfer matrix method is utilized and is combined with the midpoint Runge-kutta scheme to improve the accuracy of the non-linear analysis. The validity and effectiveness of the proposed method are then confirmed through several numerical examples of beams which are supported by nonlinear springs and a rotor which is supported by nonlinear bearings.