The goal of this Small Grant for Exploratory Research (SGER) is to apply utility theory to engineering design, including the consideration of uncertainty. An aim is to address computational complexity using an efficient simulation technique referred to as Optimal Computing Budget Allocation. This algorithm seeks to identify the optimal design under uncertainty through the elimination of undesired designs with minimal information, thereby obviating the need to do extensive computations on all design alternatives.
If successful, this method should provide a design framework that is flexible enough to address a wide variety of engineering design situations, and the method should provide a new set of design tools that explicitly incorporate uncertainty, while taking advantage of advancements in modeling and computing technology.
