A DESIGN THEORY OF MATERIAL SYSTEMS

Abstract

The problem of obtaining the material systems with more enhanced material constants characterizing physical property is considered within the framework of Suh's theory of design. The design problem is to find the mapping between the functional requirements (FR) and the design parameters (DP). The material parameters (the design parameters) for the material design are unable to move freely. Thus, our strategy is to substantially decrease the number of design parameters and to learn which directions to move the design parameters in order to efficiently enhance the material constants. To accomplish, we study the mathematical properties of the relationship, called design function, between the FRs and the DPs to find the decomposition property. The decomposition has several effective properties. We apply our method to a special case where the third-order nonlinear optical susceptibility is enhanced. We also discuss some methods for moving the material parameters as well as the scope of problems where the concept of decomposition seems to be effective.