Mathematical Model and Architecture Design for Computer Aided Modeling of Heterogeneous Objects

Heterogeneous objects (HO) especially functionallygraded materials (FGM) inspire a lot of applications in thecurrent arena. Rapid prototyping (RP) techniques have thecapabilities to fabricate such objects with designed functionalrequirements but require improved computer aided model. Theconventional modeling approaches only provide geometric andtopologic information of the modelled object but do not containany information regarding varying material composition in theobject domain, thus, can not be used for the fabrication ofheterogeneous objects (HO) through rapid prototyping. A novelmodeling approach based on voxelization technique is developedwhich ensures geometric as well as material modeling for rapidprototyping of HO. A mathematical model based on volumetricdataset is developed to represent the material variations alongwith geometric datasets. The model helps in flexiblemanipulability of material variation and also guarantees thegeometric accuracy of fabricated heterogeneous object. Thefunctional relations between basic requirements along with theirrespective solutions for the developed modeling approach areestablished. Different modules for rapid manufacturing ofheterogeneous objects i.e. geometric modeling, material modeling,slicing, visualization and displaying are defined and computerarchitecture is designed for integrating these modules. Fewexamples are demonstrated to show the validation of designedarchitecture.