Ant colony optimization (ACO) is a class of heuristic algorithms proposed to solve optimization problems. The idea was inspired by the behavior of real ants, related to their ability to find the shortest path between the nest and the food source. ACO has been applied successfully to different kinds of problems. So, this manuscript describes the development and application of an ACO algorithm to find the optimal stacking sequence of laminated composite plates. The developed ACO algorithm was evaluated on four examples for symmetric and balanced lay-up. The results of the first three cases, in which the classical lamination theory was used to obtain the structural response of rectangular plates, were compared to those obtained from the literature using genetic algorithms (GA) and other ACO algorithm. The fourth example investigates the maximization of fundamental frequencies of rectangular plates with central holes, where the structural response was obtained by finite element analysis, showing that this optimization technique may be successfully applied to a broad class of stacking sequence problems for laminated composites.

ABSTRACT: The success in developing modern aerospace systems addresses competitive subjects as optimization, reduced costs, sustainability, environment, weight, and safety. There is an increased demand for lighter materials such as laminated composites. In order to match the demand of aeronautical companies, the shell structures are very important. The dynamic behavior of composite structures is also essential to improve the potential applications of these materials. The knowledge of the dynamic response of the cylindrical shell structures is an important issue in their design, in which the ply thicknesses are often preestablished and the ply orientations are usually restricted to a small set of angles due to manufacturing constraints. Obtaining the best stacking sequence of laminated shell may lead to a problem of combinatorial optimization. As this problem is hard to be solved, several techniques have been developed. Ant colony optimization is a class of heuristic optimization algorithms inspired by the behavior of real ants, related to their ability to find the shortest path between the nest and the food source. Thus, this paper deals with optimal stacking sequence of laminated cylindrical composite shells with the aim of maximizing their fundamental frequency using this approach. The ant colony algorithm was implemented in Matlab platform and was linked to Abaqus academic version to compute the structural response. Cylindrical shells with and without a cutout geometry were studied. Fundamental frequencies were maximized for both cases, and results were presented and discussed.