Section: Application Domains

Multidisciplinary optimization

A CFD program computes the flow around a shape, starting from a number of inputs that define the shape and other parameters. On this flow one can define optimization criteria e.g. the lift of an aircraft. To optimize a criterion by a gradient descent, one needs the gradient of the output criterion with respect to all the inputs, and possibly additional gradients when there are constraints. Adjoint AD is the most efficient way to compute these gradients.