LEVEL SET METHODS BASED ON DISTANCE FUNCTION

Some basic problems on the level set methods were discussed, such as the method used to preserve the distance junction , the existence and uniqueness of solution for the level set equations. The main contribution is to prove that in a neighborhood of the initial zero level set, the level set equations with the restriction of the distance function have a unique solution, which must be the signed distance function with respect to the evolving surface. Some skillful approaches were used: Noticing that any solution for the original equation was a distance function, the original level set equations were transformed into a simpler alternative form. Moreover, since the new system was not a classical one, the system was transformed into an ordinary one, for which the implicit function method was adopted.

The shape optimization of the arterial graft design by level set methods

The goal of the arterial graft design problem is to find an optimal graft built on an occluded artery, which can be mathematically modeled by a fluid based shape optimization problem. The smoothness of the graft is one of the important aspects in the arterial graft design problem since it affects the flow of the blood significantly. As an attractive design tool for this problem, level set methods are quite efficient for obtaining better shape of the graft. In this paper, a cubic spline level set method and a radial basis function level set method are designed to solve the arterial graft design problem. In both approaches, the shape of the arterial graft is implicitly tracked by the zero-level contour of a level set function and a high level of smoothness of the graft is achieved. Numerical results show the efficiency of the algorithms in the arterial graft design.

A Hybrid Level Set Optimization Design Method of Functionally Graded Cellular Structures Considering Connectivity

With the continuous advancement in topology optimization and additive manufacturing(AM)technology,the capability to fabricate functionally graded materials and intricate cellular structures with spatially varying microstructures has grown significantly.However,a critical challenge is encountered in the design of these structures–the absence of robust interface connections between adjacent microstructures,potentially resulting in diminished efficiency or macroscopic failure.A Hybrid Level Set Method(HLSM)is proposed,specifically designed to enhance connectivity among non-uniform microstructures,contributing to the design of functionally graded cellular structures.The HLSM introduces a pioneering algorithm for effectively blending heterogeneous microstructure interfaces.Initially,an interpolation algorithm is presented to construct transition microstructures seamlessly connected on both sides.Subsequently,the algorithm enables the morphing of non-uniform unit cells to seamlessly adapt to interconnected adjacent microstructures.The method,seamlessly integrated into a multi-scale topology optimization framework using the level set method,exhibits its efficacy through numerical examples,showcasing its prowess in optimizing 2D and 3D functionally graded materials(FGM)and multi-scale topology optimization.In essence,the pressing issue of interface connections in complex structure design is not only addressed but also a robust methodology is introduced,substantiated by numerical evidence,advancing optimization capabilities in the realm of functionally graded materials and cellular structures.

Topology Optimization for Steady-State Navier-Stokes Flow Based on Parameterized Level Set Based Method

In this paper,we consider solving the topology optimization for steady-state incompressibleNavier-Stokes problems via a new topology optimization method called parameterized level set method,which can maintain a relatively smooth level set function with a local optimality condition.The objective of topology optimization is to􀀀nd an optimal con􀀀guration of theuid and solid materials that minimizes power dissipation under a prescribeduid volume fraction constraint.An arti􀀀cial friction force is added to the Navier-Stokes equations to apply the no-slip boundary condition.Although a great deal of work has been carried out for topology optimization ofuidow in recent years,there are few researches on the topology optimization ofuidow with physical body forces.To simulate theuidow in reality,the constant body force(e.g.,gravity)is considered in this paper.Several 2D numerical examples are presented to discuss the relationships between the proposed method with Reynolds number and initial design,and demonstrate the feasibility and superiority of the proposed method in dealing with unstructuredmesh problems.Three 3D numerical examples demonstrate the proposedmethod is feasible in three-dimensional.

Level set band method: A combination of density-based and level set methods for the topology optimization of continuums

The level set method(LSM),which is transplanted from the computer graphics field,has been successfully introduced into the structural topology optimization field for about two decades,but it still has not been widely applied to practical engineering problems as density-based methods do.One of the reasons is that it acts as a boundary evolution algorithm,which is not as flexible as density-based methods at controlling topology changes.In this study,a level set band method is proposed to overcome this drawback in handling topology changes in the level set framework.This scheme is proposed to improve the continuity of objective and constraint functions by incorporating one parameter,namely,level set band,to seamlessly combine LSM and density-based method to utilize their advantages.The proposed method demonstrates a flexible topology change by applying a certain size of the level set band and can converge to a clear boundary representation methodology.The method is easy to implement for improving existing LSMs and does not require the introduction of penalization or filtering factors that are prone to numerical issues.Several 2D and 3D numerical examples of compliance minimization problems are studied to illustrate the effects of the proposed method.

A Low Mach Number IMEX Flux Splitting for the Level Set Ghost Fluid Method

Considering droplet phenomena at low Mach numbers,large differences in the magnitude of the occurring characteristic waves are presented.As acoustic phenomena often play a minor role in such applications,classical explicit schemes which resolve these waves suffer from a very restrictive timestep restriction.In this work,a novel scheme based on a specific level set ghost fluid method and an implicit-explicit(IMEX)flux splitting is proposed to overcome this timestep restriction.A fully implicit narrow band around the sharp phase interface is combined with a splitting of the convective and acoustic phenomena away from the interface.In this part of the domain,the IMEX Runge-Kutta time discretization and the high order discontinuous Galerkin spectral element method are applied to achieve high accuracies in the bulk phases.It is shown that for low Mach numbers a significant gain in computational time can be achieved compared to a fully explicit method.Applica-tions to typical droplet dynamic phenomena validate the proposed method and illustrate its capabilities.

Binary Level Set Methods for Dynamic Reservoir Characterization by Operator Splitting Scheme

In this paper,operator splitting scheme for dynamic reservoir characterization by binary level set method is employed.For this problem,the absolute permeability of the two-phase porous medium flow can be simulated by the constrained augmented Lagrangian optimization method with well data and seismic time-lapse data.By transforming the constrained optimization problem in an unconstrained one,the saddle point problem can be solved by Uzawas algorithms with operator splitting scheme,which is based on the essence of binary level set method.Both the simple and complicated numerical examples demonstrate that the given algorithms are stable and efficient and the absolute permeability can be satisfactorily recovered.

Multi-Valued Solution and Level Set Methods in Computational High FrequencyWave Propagation

We review the level set methods for computing multi-valued solutions to a class of nonlinear first order partial differential equations,including Hamilton-Jacobi equations,quasi-linear hyperbolic equations,and conservative transport equations with multi-valued transport speeds.The multivalued solutions are embedded as the zeros of a set of scalar functions that solve the initial value problems of a time dependent partial differential equation in an augmented space.We discuss the essential ideas behind the techniques,the coupling of these techniques to the projection of the interaction of zero level sets and a collection of applications including the computation of the semiclassical limit for Schr¨odinger equations and the high frequency geometrical optics limits of linear wave equations.

Active Contours and Mumford-Shah Segmentation Based on Level Sets

This paper is to detect regions (objects) boundaries, also to isolate and extract individual components from a medical image. This can be done using an active contours to detect regions in a given image, based on techniques of curve evolution, Mumford Shah functional for segmentation and level sets. The paper classified the images into different intensity regions based on Markov random field, then detected regions whose boundaries are not necessarily defined by gradient by minimizing an energy of Mumford Shah functional for segmentation which can be seen as a particular case of the minimal partition problem. In the level set formulation, the problem becomes a mean curvature flow like evolving the active contour, which will stop on the desired boundary. The stopping term does not depend on the gradient of the image, as in the classical active contour and the initial curve of level set can be anywhere in the image, and interior contours are automatically detected. The final image segmentation is one closed boundary per actual region in the image.

A LEVEL SET METHOD FOR STRUCTURAL TOPOLOGY OPTIMIZATION WITH MULTI-CONSTRAINTS AND MULTI-MATERIALS

Combining the vector level set model,the shape sensitivity analysis theory with the gradient projection technique,a level set method for topology optimization with multi-constraints and multi-materials is presented in this paper.The method implicitly describes structural material in- terfaces by the vector level set and achieves the optimal shape and topology through the continuous evolution of the material interfaces in the structure.In order to increase computational efficiency for a fast convergence,an appropriate nonlinear speed mapping is established in the tangential space of the active constraints.Meanwhile,in order to overcome the numerical instability of general topology opti- mization problems,the regularization with the mean curvature flow is utilized to maintain the interface smoothness during the optimization process.The numerical examples demonstrate that the approach possesses a good flexibility in handling topological changes and gives an interface representation in a high fidelity,compared with other methods based on explicit boundary variations in the literature.

Simulation of Non-isothermal Injection Molding for a Non-Newtonian Fluid by Level Set Method

A non-isothermal injection molding process for a non-Newtonian viscous pseudoplastic fluid is simulated.A conservative interface capturing technique and the flow field solving method are coupled to perform a dynamic simulation.The validity of the numerical method is verified by a benchmark problem.The melt interface evolution versus time is captured and the physical quantities such as temperature,velocity and pressure at each time step are obtained with corresponding analysis.A"frozen skin"layer with the thickness increasing versus time during the injection process is found.The fact that the"frozen skin"layer can be reduced by increasing the injection velocity is numerically verified.The fountain flow phenomenon near the melt interface is also captured.Moreover,comparisons with the non-isothermal Newtonian case show that the curvatures of the interface arcs and the pressure contours near the horizontal mid-line of the cavity for the non-Newtonian pseudoplastic case is larger than that for the Newtonian case.The velocity profiles are different at different positions for the non-Newtonian pseudoplastic case,while in the case of Newtonian flow the velocity profiles are parabolic and almost the same at different positions.

Level set method for numerical simulation of a cavitation bubble,its growth, collapse and rebound near a rigid wall

A level set method of non-uniform grids is used to simulate the whole evolution of a cavitation bubble, including its growth, collapse and rebound near a rigid wall. Single-phase Navier-Stokes equation in the liquid region is solved by MAC projection algorithm combined with second-order ENO scheme for the advection terms. The moving inter-face is captured by the level set function, and the interface velocity is resolved by ＂one-side＂ velocity extension from the liquid region to the bubble region, complementing the second-order weighted least squares method across the interface and projection inside bubble. The use of non-uniform grid overcomes the difficulty caused by the large computational domain and very small bubble size. The computation is very stable without suffering from large flow-field gradients, and the results are in good agreements with other studies. The bubble interface kinematics, dynamics and its effect on the wall are highlighted, which shows that the code can effectively capture the ＂shock wave＂-like pressure and velocity at jet impact, toroidal bubble, and complicated pressure structure with peak, plateau and valley in the later stage of bubble oscillating.

A level set based segmentation approach for point-sampled surfaces

Segmenting a complex 3D surface model into some visually meaningful sub-parts is one of the fundamental problems in digital geometry processing. In this paper, a novel segmentation approach of point-sampled surfaces is proposed, which is based on the level set evolution scheme. To segment the model so as to align the patch boundaries with high curvature zones, the driven speed function for the zero level set inside narrow band is defined by the extended curvature field, which approaches zero speed as the propagating front approaches high curvature zone. The effectiveness of the proposed approach is demonstrated by our ex- perimental results. Furthermore, two applications of model segmentation are illustrated, such as piecewise parameterization and local editing for point-sampled geometry.

Numerical simulation of single bubble rising in shear-thinning fluids by level set method

The behavior of single bubble rising in quiescent shear-thinning tlmds was lnvestlgateO numerically by level set metnoa. number of bubbles in a large range of Reynolds number and Eotvos number were investigated including spherical, oblate and spherical. The bubble shape and drag coefficient were compared with experimental results. It is observed that the simulated results show good conformity to experimental results over a wide range of Reynolds number. In addition, the detailed flow field based on the reference coordinate system moving with the bubble is obtained, and the relationship among flow field, bubble shape and velocity is discussed.

Structural Topology Design of Container Ship Based on Knowledge-Based Engineering and Level Set Method

Knowledge-Based Engineering （KBE） is introduced into the ship structural design in this paper. From the implementation of KBE, the design solutions for both Rules Design Method （RDM） and Interpolation Design Method （IDM） are generated. The corresponding Finite Element （FE） models are generated. Topological design of the longitudinal structures is studied where the Gaussian Process （GP） is employed to build the surrogate model for FE analysis. Multi-objective optimization methods inspired by Pareto Front are used to reduce the design tank weight and outer surface area simultaneously. Additionally, an enhanced Level Set Method （LSM） which employs implicit algorithm is applied to the topological design of typical bracket plate which is used extensively in ship structures. Two different sets of boundary conditions are considered. The proposed methods show satisfactory efficiency and accuracy.

LEVEL SET METHOD FOR TOPOLOGICAL OPTIMIZATION APPLYING TO STRUCTURE, MECHANISM AND MATERIAL DESIGNS

Based on a level set model, a topology optimization method has been suggestedrecently. It uses a level set to express the moving structural boundary, which can flexibly handlecomplex topological changes. By combining vector level set models with gradient projectiontechnology, the level set method for topological optimization is extended to a topologicaloptimization problem with multi-constraints, multi-materials and multi-load cases. Meanwhile, anappropriate nonlinear speed, mapping is established in the tangential space of the activeconstraints for a fast convergence. Then the method is applied to structure designs, mechanism andmaterial designs by a number of benchmark examples. Finally, in order to further improvecomputational efficiency and overcome the difficulty that the level set method cannot generate newmaterial interfaces during the optimization process, the topological derivative analysis isincorporated into the level set method for topological optimization, and a topological derivativeand level set algorithm for topological optimization is proposed.

3D Multiphase Piecewise Constant Level Set Method Based on Graph Cut Minimization

Segmentation of three-dimensional(3D) complicated structures is of great importance for many real applications.In this work we combine graph cut minimization method with a variant of the level set idea for 3D segmentation based on the Mumford-Shah model.Compared with the traditional approach for solving the Euler-Lagrange equation we do not need to solve any partial differential equations.Instead,the minimum cut on a special designed graph need to be computed.The method is tested on data with complicated structures.It is rather stable with respect to initial value and the algorithm is nearly parameter free.Experiments show that it can solve large problems much faster than traditional approaches.

New normalized nonlocal hybrid level set method for image segmentation

This article introduces a new normalized nonlocal hybrid level set method for image segmentation.Due to intensity overlapping,blurred edges with complex backgrounds,simple intensity and texture information,such kind of image segmentation is still a challenging task.The proposed method uses both the region and boundary information to achieve accurate segmentation results.The region information can help to identify rough region of interest and prevent the boundary leakage problem.It makes use of normalized nonlocal comparisons between pairs of patches in each region,and a heuristic intensity model is proposed to suppress irrelevant strong edges and constrain the segmentation.The boundary information can help to detect the precise location of the target object,it makes use of the geodesic active contour model to obtain the target boundary.The corresponding variational segmentation problem is implemented by a level set formulation.We use an internal energy term for geometric active contours to penalize the deviation of the level set function from a signed distance function.At last,experimental results on synthetic images and real images are shown in the paper with promising results.

Topology and Shape Optimization of 2-D and 3-D Micro-ArchitecturedThermoelastic Metamaterials Using a Parametric Level Set Method

2-D and 3-D micro-architectured multiphase thermoelastic metamaterials are designed and analyzed using a parametric level set method for topology optimization and the finite element method.An asymptotic homogenization approach is employed to obtain the effective thermoelastic properties of the multiphase metamaterials.Theε-constraint multi-objective optimization method is adopted in the formulation.The coefficient of thermal expansion(CTE)and Poisson’s ratio(PR)are chosen as two objective functions,with the CTE optimized and the PR treated as a constraint.The optimization problems are solved by using the method of moving asymptotes.Effective isotropic and anisotropic CTEs and stiffness constants are obtained for the topologically optimized metamaterials with prescribed values of PR under the constraints of specified effective bulk modulus,volume fractions and material symmetry.Two solid materials along with one additional void phase are involved in each of the 2-D and 3-D optimal design examples.The numerical results reveal that the newly proposed approach can integrate shape and topology optimizations and lead to optimal microstructures with distinct topological boundaries.The current method can topologically optimize metamaterials with a positive,negative or zero CTE and a positive,negative or zero Poisson’s ratio.

A Parameter-Free Approach to Determine the Lagrange Multiplier in the Level Set Method by Using the BESO

A parameter-free approach is proposed to determine the Lagrange multiplier for the constraint of material volume in the level set method.It is inspired by the procedure of determining the threshold of sensitivity number in the BESO method.It first computes the difference between the volume of current design and the upper bound of volume.Then,the Lagrange multiplier is regarded as the threshold of sensitivity number to remove the redundant material.Numerical examples proved that this approach is effective to constrain the volume.More importantly,there is no parameter in the proposed approach,which makes it convenient to use.In addition,the convergence is stable,and there is no big oscillation.