Efficient inverse radiation analysis in a cylindrical geometry using a combined method of hybrid genetic algorithm and finite-difference Newton method

An inverse radiation problem was considered to estimate boundary conditions such as temperature distribution and emissivity in axisymmetric absorbing, emitting, and scattering medium, given the measured incident radiative heat fluxes. The finite-volume method was employed to solve a direct radiative transfer equation for a two-dimensional axisymmetric geometry. Various parameter estimators, such as conjugate-gradient method, hybrid genetic algorithm, and finite-difference Newton method, were employed to solve the inverse problems, while discussing their performances in terms of estimation accuracy and computational efficiency. Based on this, we proposed, as a best inverse analysis tool, a new combined method that adopted the hybrid genetic algorithm as an initial value selector and used the finite-difference Newton method as a parameter estimator.(c) 2007 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.