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Reduced-Order Models for Faster Structural and Thermal Analysis

Reduced-order modeling (ROM) is a technique for reducing the computational complexity of a full-order, high-fidelity model while preserving the expected fidelity within a satisfactory error. Working with reduced-order models can simplify structural and thermal analysis, enabling you to solve a problem more quickly while saving computational resources.

Finite-element discretized models can be very large. Model order reduction techniques approximate the dynamics of the original system with a smaller system while retaining most of the dynamic characteristics.

You also can use generated ROM data to simulate dynamics of your system in Simscape™ and then expand the Simscape solution to a full model. For examples showing this process, see Model an Excavator Dipper Arm as a Flexible Body (Simscape Multibody) and Battery Module Cooling Analysis and Reduced-Order Thermal Model.

Structural Analysis

For structural mechanics, Partial Differential Equation Toolbox™ uses the Craig-Bampton method, which is designed for specific PDE-based models. This method separates degrees of freedom (DoFs) for the specified superelement interfaces into modal DoFs in the specified range (which are retained) and all other internal DoFs. Follow these steps to create a reduced-order model for structural mechanics problems:

  1. Create an femodel object for modal or transient structural analysis and include the geometry.

  2. If you intend to use ROM data Simscape Multibody™, use romInterface to set a multipoint constraint. Simscape models expect the connections at all joints to have six degrees of freedom, while Partial Differential Equation Toolbox uses two or three degrees of freedom at each node. Setting a multipoint constraint ensures that all six degrees of freedom for the specified geometric regions have a rigid constraint with a reference point.

  3. Define superelement interfaces by using romInterface.

  4. Reduce the model by using reduce.

Thermal Analysis

For linear heat transfer problems, you can use eigenvalue or proper orthogonal decomposition (POD) to compute the modes, and then extract the reduced modal system. Follow these steps to create a reduced-order model for thermal problems:

  1. Create an femodel object for modal or transient thermal analysis and include the geometry.

  2. Compute eigenvalue or POD modes by using solve.

  3. Reduce the model by using reduce.

Reconstruct Structural Solution from ROM Results

Knowing the solution in terms of the interface degrees of freedom (DoFs) and modal DoFs, reconstruct the solution for the full structural transient analysis.

Define Parameters for Structural Analysis

Create a square cross-section beam geometry.

gm = multicuboid(0.05,0.003,0.003);

Plot the geometry, displaying face and edge labels.

figure
pdegplot(gm,FaceLabels="on",FaceAlpha=0.5)
view([71 4])

Figure contains an axes object. The axes object contains 6 objects of type quiver, text, patch, line.

figure
pdegplot(gm,EdgeLabels="on",FaceAlpha=0.5)
view([71 4])

Figure contains an axes object. The axes object contains 6 objects of type quiver, text, patch, line.

Add a vertex at the center of face 3.

centerVertex = addVertex(gm,Coordinates=[0.025 0.0 0.0015]);

Create an femodel object for transient structural analysis and include the geometry in the model.

model = femodel(AnalysisType="structuralTransient", ...
                 Geometry=gm);

Specify Young's modulus, Poisson's ratio, and the mass density of the material.

model.MaterialProperties = ...
    materialProperties(YoungsModulus=210E9, ...
                       PoissonsRatio=0.3, ...
                       MassDensity=7800);

Fix one end of the beam.

model.EdgeBC([2 8 11 12]) = edgeBC(Constraint="fixed");

Generate a mesh.

model = generateMesh(model);

Apply a sinusoidal concentrated force in the z-direction on the new vertex. First, define a sinusoidal load function, sinusoidalLoad, to model a harmonic load. This function accepts the load magnitude (amplitude), location and state structure arrays, frequency, and phase. Because the function depends on time, it must return a matrix of NaN of the correct size when state.time is NaN. Solvers check whether a problem is nonlinear or time-dependent by passing NaN state values and looking for returned NaN values.

function Tn = sinusoidalLoad(load,location,state,Frequency,Phase)
if isnan(state.time)
    normal = [location.nx location.ny];
    if isfield(location,"nz")
        normal = [normal location.nz];
    end
    Tn = NaN*normal;
    return
end
if isa(load,"function_handle")
    load = load(location,state);
else
    load = load(:);
end
% Transient model excited with harmonic load
Tn = load.*sin(Frequency.*state.time + Phase);
end

Now apply the force on the new vertex.

Force = [0 0 10];
Frequency = 6000;
Phase = 0;
forcePulse = @(location,state) ...
    sinusoidalLoad(Force,location,state,Frequency,Phase);
model.VertexLoad(centerVertex) = vertexLoad(Force=forcePulse);

Specify zero initial conditions.

model.CellIC = cellIC(Velocity=[0 0 0],Displacement=[0 0 0]);

Reduce Model

Specify the fixed and loaded boundaries as structural superelement interfaces by creating a romInterface object for each superelement interface. The reduced-order model technique retains the DoFs on the superelement interfaces while condensing all other DoFs to a set of modal DoFs. For better performance, use the set of edges bounding face 5 instead of using the entire face.

romObj1 = romInterface(Edge=[2 8 11 12]);
romObj2 = romInterface(Vertex=centerVertex);

Assign a vector of interface objects to the ROMInterfaces property of the model.

model.ROMInterfaces = [romObj1,romObj2];

Reduce the structure, retaining all fixed interface modes up to 5e5.

rom = reduce(model,FrequencyRange=[-0.1,5e5]);

Simulate Transient Dynamics Using ROM

Next, use the reduced-order model to simulate the transient dynamics. Use the ode15s function directly to integrate the reduced system of ordinary differential equations. Take the loaded and modal DoFs for time-integration, and leave the fixed DoFs aside because the solution remains zero for those DoFs.

Working with the reduced model requires indexing into the reduced system matrices rom.K and rom.M. The arrangement of DoFs in reduced system is such that the physical DoFs corresponding to retained interfaces appear first followed by the generalized model DoFs. DoFs in a structural problem correspond to translational displacements. If the number of mesh points in a model is Nn, then the software assigns the IDs to the DoFs as follows: the first 1 to Nn are x-displacements, Nn+1 to 2*Nn are y-displacements, and 2Nn+1 to 3*Nn are z-displacements. Only the subset of these 3*Nn DoFs corresponding to ROMInterfaces is retained in the reduced model. The reduced model object rom contains these IDs for the retained DoFs in rom.RetainedDoF.

Create a function that returns DoF IDs given node IDs and the number of nodes.

getDoF = @(x,numNodes) [x(:); x(:) + numNodes; x(:) + 2*numNodes];

Find the node at the loaded vertex.

loadedNode = findNodes(rom.Mesh,"region",Vertex=centerVertex);

Find the DoF of the loaded nodes using the helper function getDoF.

numNodes = size(rom.Mesh.Nodes,2);
loadDoFs = getDoF(loadedNode,numNodes);

Knowing the DoF IDs for the given node IDs, use rom.RetainedDoF and the intersect function to find the required indices corresponding to those DoF in the reduced matrices.

[~,loadNodeROMIds] = intersect(rom.RetainedDoF,loadDoFs);

In the reduced matrices rom.K and rom.M, generalized modal DoFs appear after the retained DoFs. Find the indices of modal DoFs in rom matrices.

modelDoFIDs = ((numel(rom.RetainedDoF) + 1):size(rom.K,1))';

Find the indices for the ODE DoFs in reduced matrices. Because fixed-end DoFs are not a part of the ODE system, these indices are as follows.

odeDoFs = [loadNodeROMIds;modelDoFIDs];

Find the relevant components of rom.K and rom.M for time integration.

Kconstrained = rom.K(odeDoFs,odeDoFs);
Mconstrained = rom.M(odeDoFs,odeDoFs);
numODE = numel(odeDoFs);

Now you have a second-order system of ODEs. To use ode15s, you must convert this system into a system of first-order ODEs by applying linearization. This type of a first-order system is twice the size of the second-order system.

Mode = [eye(numODE,numODE),   zeros(numODE,numODE); ...
        zeros(numODE,numODE), Mconstrained];
Kode = [zeros(numODE,numODE), -eye(numODE,numODE); ...
        Kconstrained,         zeros(numODE,numODE)];
Fode = zeros(2*numODE,1);

The specified concentrated force load in the full system is along the z-direction, which is the third DoF in the ODE system. Accounting for the linearization, obtain the first-order system to get the loaded ODE DoF.

loadODEDoF = numODE + 3;

Specify the mass matrix and the Jacobian for the ODE solver.

odeoptions = odeset;
odeoptions = odeset(odeoptions,"Jacobian",-Kode);
odeoptions = odeset(odeoptions,"Mass",Mode);

Specify zero initial conditions.

u0 = zeros(2*numODE,1);

Solve the reduced system by using ode15s and the helper function.

function f = CMSODEf(t,u,Kode,Fode,centerVertex)
Fode(centerVertex) = 10*sin(6000*t);
f = -Kode*u +Fode;
end

tlist = 0:0.00005:3E-3;
sol = ode15s(@(t,y) CMSODEf(t,y,Kode,Fode,loadODEDoF), ...
                                 tlist,u0,odeoptions);

Compute the values of the ODE variable and the time derivatives.

[displ,vel] = deval(sol,tlist);

Reconstruct Solution for Full Model

Knowing the solution in terms of the interface DoFs and modal DoFs, you can reconstruct the solution for the full model. The reconstructSolution function requires the displacement, velocity, and acceleration at all DoFs in rom. Create the complete solution vector, including the zero values at the fixed DoFs.

u = zeros(size(rom.K,1),numel(tlist));
ut = zeros(size(rom.K,1),numel(tlist));
utt = zeros(size(rom.K,1),numel(tlist));
u(odeDoFs,:) = displ(1:numODE,:);
ut(odeDoFs,:) = vel(1:numODE,:);
utt(odeDoFs,:) = vel(numODE+1:2*numODE,:);

Create a transient results object using this solution.

RTrom = reconstructSolution(rom,u,ut,utt,tlist);

Compute the displacement in the interior at the center of the beam using the reconstructed solution.

coordCenter = [0;0;0];
iDispRTrom = interpolateDisplacement(RTrom,coordCenter);
figure
plot(tlist,iDispRTrom.uz)
title("Z-Displacement at Geometric Center")

Figure contains an axes object. The axes object with title Z-Displacement at Geometric Center contains an object of type line.

Reconstruct Thermal Solution from ROM Results

Reconstruct the solution for a full thermal transient analysis from the reduced-order model.

Create an femodel object for transient thermal analysis, and include a unit square geometry in the model.

model = femodel(AnalysisType="thermalTransient", ...
                Geometry=@squareg);

Plot the geometry, displaying edge labels.

pdegplot(model,EdgeLabels="on")
xlim([-1.1 1.1])
ylim([-1.1 1.1])

Figure contains an axes object. The axes object contains 5 objects of type line, text.

Specify the thermal conductivity, mass density, and specific heat of the material.

model.MaterialProperties = ...
    materialProperties(ThermalConductivity=400, ...
                       MassDensity=1300, ...
                       SpecificHeat=600);

Set the temperature on the right edge to 100.

model.EdgeBC(2) = edgeBC(Temperature=100);

Set an initial value of 50 for the temperature.

model.FaceIC = faceIC(Temperature=50);

Generate a mesh.

model = generateMesh(model);

Solve the model for three different values of heat source, and collect snapshots.

tlist = 0:10:600;
snapShotIDs = [1:10 59 60 61];
Tmatrix = [];

heatVariation = [10000 15000 20000];
for q = heatVariation
    model.FaceLoad = faceLoad(Heat=q);
    results = solve(model,tlist);
    Tmatrix = [Tmatrix,results.Temperature(:,snapShotIDs)];
end

Switch the thermal model analysis type to modal.

model.AnalysisType = "thermalModal";

Compute the POD modes.

RModal = solve(model,Snapshots=Tmatrix);

Reduce the thermal model.

Rtherm = reduce(model,ModalResults=RModal) 
Rtherm = 
  ReducedThermalModel with properties:

                    K: [6x6 double]
                    M: [6x6 double]
                    F: [6x1 double]
    InitialConditions: [6x1 double]
                 Mesh: [1x1 FEMesh]
           ModeShapes: [1529x5 double]
     SnapshotsAverage: [1529x1 double]

Next, use the reduced-order model to simulate the transient dynamics. Use the ode15s function directly to integrate the reduced system ODE. Specify the mass matrix and the Jacobian for the ODE solver.

odeoptions = odeset;
odeoptions = odeset(odeoptions,Mass=Rtherm.M);
odeoptions = odeset(odeoptions,JConstant="on");
f = @(t,u) -Rtherm.K*u + Rtherm.F;
df = -Rtherm.K;
odeoptions = odeset(odeoptions,Jacobian=df);

Solve the reduced system by using ode15s.

sol = ode15s(f,tlist,Rtherm.InitialConditions,odeoptions);

Compute the values of the ODE variable.

u = deval(sol,tlist);

Reconstruct the solution for the full model.

R = reconstructSolution(Rtherm,u,tlist);

Plot the temperature distribution at the last time step.

pdeplot(R.Mesh,XYData=R.Temperature(:,end))

Figure contains an axes object. The axes object contains an object of type patch.