Design sensitivity coefficients for axisymmetric elasticity problems by boundary element methods

Abstract The subject of this paper is the determination of design sensitivity coefficients (DSC's) for axisymmetric elasticity problems. The direct differentiation approach (DDA) is used for the analysis in conjunction with the boundary element method (BEM). Numerical results for the DSC's of surface tractions and displacements, for some examples, are presented in the paper. The results obtained by the BEM are compared with those from the finite difference method (FDM).