2009, Hömberg, Dietmar, Kern, Daniela

The goal of this paper is to show how the heat treatment of steel can be modelled in terms of a mathematical optimal control problem. The approach is applied to laser surface hardening and the cooling of a steel slab including mechanical effects. Finally, it is shown how the results can be utilized in industrial practice by a coupling with machine-based control.

2007, Chełminski, Krzysztof, Hömberg, Dietmar, Kern, Daniela

We investigate a thermomechanical model of phase transitions in steel. The strain is assumed to be additively decomposed into an elastic and a thermal part as well as a contribution from transformation induced plasticity. The resulting model can be viewed as an extension of quasistatic linear thermoelasticity. We prove existence of a unique solution and conclude with some numerical simulations.

2007, Göllmann, Laurenz, Kern, Daniela, Maurer, Helmut

Optimal control problems with delays in state and control variables are studied. Constraints are imposed as mixed control-state inequality constraints. Necessary optimality conditions in the form of Pontryagin's minimum principle are established. The proof proceeds by augmenting the delayed control problem to a nondelayed problem with mixed terminal boundary conditions to which Pontryagin's minimum principle is applicable. Discretization methods for the delayed control problem are discussed which amount to solving a large-scale nonlinear programming problem. It is shown that the Lagrange multipliers associated with the programming problem provide a consistent discretization of the advanced adjoint equation for the delayed control problem. An analytical example and two numerical examples from chemical engineering and economics illustrate the results.