The Cholesky rank-one update/downdate algorithm for static reanalysis with modifications of support constraints

Structural reanalysis is frequently utilized to reduce the computational cost so that the process of design or optimization can be accelerated. The supports can be regarded as the design variables and may be modified in various types of structural optimization problems. The location, number, and type of supports can make a great impact on the performance of the structure. This paper presents a unified method for structural static reanalysis with imposition or relaxation of some support constraints. The information from the initial analysis has been fully utilized and the computational time can be significantly reduced. Numerical examples are used to validate the effectiveness of the proposed method.