Complex-shaped beam element and graph-based optimization of compliant mechanisms

Compliant mechanisms are designed to be intentionally flexible, providing hingeless mechanisms. This work contributes a complex-shaped beam element formulation in conjunction with the ground structure approach. We identify compliant mechanism design solutions by using evolutionary topology optimization and increase flexibility by using a parametrization concept based on graph theory. The new operators for evolutionary optimization are also explained and sample problems are used to address the question of how our contribution increases design solutions space.