A dynamic Gaussian process surrogate model based on the grasshopper optimization algorithm for non-probabilistic reliability analysis of complex structures

AbstractAbstractIn practical complex engineering structures, the performance function (PF) for reliability analysis is commonly implicit and highly nonlinear. Commonly used surrogate models are appropriate for structural reliability analysis with an implicit PF. However, these methods require hundreds of PF values, which are time-consuming to obtain by adopting numerical analysis, such as finite element analysis (FEA). Therefore, since non-probabilistic reliability analysis does not require a large number of samples, it has great development potential. In this paper, a dynamic Gaussian process (GP) surrogate model based on the grasshopper optimization algorithm (DGP-GOA) is proposed for the non-probabilistic reliability analysis. First, with the help of the scale factor of the convex set model, the non-probabilistic reliability analysis problem is transformed into an unconstrained optimization problem. Second, the DGP-GOA fits the PF by constructing a GP surrogate model with a small dataset. Third, the GOA is used to search for the global optimal solution to obtain a non-probabilistic reliability index. Then, a dynamic retraining strategy is proposed to improve the fitting accuracy and efficiency. The results demonstrate that the proposed method is highly applicable to the non-probabilistic structural reliability analysis of complex engineering structures.Keywords: Finite element analysisGaussian processgrasshopper optimization algorithmnon-probabilistic probabilistic theoryperformance functionstructural reliabilitysurrogate model Disclosure statementNo potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.Additional informationFundingThe authors greatly gratefully acknowledge the financial support from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 52169021, 51869003), the High Level Innovation Team and Outstanding Scholar Program of Universities in Guangxi Province (Grant No. 202006) and the Interdisciplinary Scientific Research Foundation of Guangxi University (Grant No. 2022JCA004).