Solution Of Mixed-discrete StructuralOptimization With Evolution Strategy

A method for the solution of mixed-discrete structural optimization problems based on a two level parallel evolution strategy is presented. On the first level, the optimization problem is divided into two subproblems with discrete and continuous design variables, respectively. The two subproblems are solved simultaneously on a parallel computing architecture. On the second level, each subproblem is further parallelized by means of a parallel sub-evolution-strategy. Periodically, the design variables in the two groups are exchanged. Examples are included to demonstrate the implementation of this method on a 8 nodes parallel computer.