An approach based on rough sets theory to design space exploration of complex systems

Abstract

In this paper, to satify the need of engineeing design, and quickly map the performance space to the regions of the design space, a promising approach combined Fuzzy c-means algorithm (FCM) and Rough Sets Theory (RST) in incomplete systems is elaborated. On the base of discretizing continuous variables by FCM, RST in incomplete systems is utilized to extract design scheme rules to assist designers with mapping performance space to regions of desgin space. Finally, a conceptual design of 50000 DWT bulk carrier is taken as a case study to prove the validity of the approach. © Springer-Verlag London Limited 2009.