Automated Design of Both the Topology and Sizing of Analog Electrical Circuits Using Genetic Programming

: This paper describes an automated process for designing analog electrical circuits based on the principles of natural selection, sexual recombination, and developmental biology. The design process starts with the random creation of a large population of program trees composed of circuit-constructing functions. Each program tree specifies the steps by which a fully developed circuit is to be progressively developed from a common embryonic circuit appropriate for the type of circuit that the user wishes to design. Each fully developed circuit is translated into a netlist, simulated using a modified version of SPICE, and evaluated as to how well it satisfies the user's design requirements. The fitness measure is a user-written computer program that may incorporate any calculable characteristic or combination of characteristics of the circuit, including the circuit's behavior in the time domain, its behavior in the frequency domain, its power consumption, the number of components, cost o..

A review of research, commercial software packages and patents on family mould layout design automation and optimisation

Family mould layout design (FMLD) is demanding and experience-dependent. It involves many sub-design tasks that determine the cost and performance of a family mould in the early conceptual mould layout design phase. This paper conducts a comprehensive literature review in the field of FMLD. The review ascertains that family mould cavity and runner layout design (FMCRLD) automation and optimisation is the critical knowledge gap in FMLD, and it should be viewed as a complex combinatorial layout design optimisation problem. The second part of this paper extends the review of the literature regarding possible computational techniques for supporting FMCRLD automation and optimisation. The review discovers that the evolutionary design approach using genetic algorithms reveals a new opportunity to automate and optimise such complex FMCRLD with an explorative and generative design process embodied in a stochastic evolutionary search. However, implementation of this innovative approach is full of challenges. Further research on this topic is urgently needed