Bionic knowledge and information reuse methodology for uncertainty minimization in product design

摘要

The design process involves multiple stages to provide the solution for an actual or perceived need. The process needs different information at different stages to generate the desired output, but most of the time, the information is uncertain. Information uncertainty almost always makes design decision critical. The present work aims to reduce this information uncertainty in product design by reusing previous design knowledge. Reusing an existing ontology is an obvious way to minimize information uncertainty, and consequently, it can shorten the manufacturing lead time. However, the existing techniques have a few gaps that are still unaddressed. To fill these gaps, a methodology based on bionic engineering is proposed in this work for the purpose of design reuse in product development. Here, for the representation and manipulation of the knowledge, bionic-based reasoning approach is used for the development of the new product with the help of bionic reverse engineering. The proposed methodology is validated by illustrating an example of shoe design suitable to maneuver ill-conditioned roads. This work would be useful to the design and manufacturing practitioner in product development and decision making.