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The article considers a mathematical model of decomposition of a complex product into assembly units. This is an important engineering problem, which affects the organization of discrete production and its operational management. A review of modern approaches to mathematical modeling and automated computer-aided of decompositions is given. In them, graphs, networks, matrices, etc. serve as mathematical models of structures of technical systems. These models describe the mechanical structure as a binary relation on a set of system elements. The geometrical coordination and integrity of machines and mechanical devices during the manufacturing process is achieved by means of basing. In general, basing can be performed on several elements simultaneously. Therefore, it represents a variable arity relation, which can not be correctly described in terms of binary mathematical structures. A new hypergraph model of mechanical structure of technical system is described. This model allows to give an adequate formalization of assembly operations and processes. Assembly operations which are carried out by two working bodies and consist in realization of mechanical connections are considered. Such operations are called coherent and sequential. This is the prevailing type of operations in modern industrial practice. It is shown that the mathematical description of such operation is normal contraction of an edge of the hypergraph. A sequence of contractions transforming the hypergraph into a point is a mathematical model of the assembly process. Two important theorems on the properties of contractible hypergraphs and their subgraphs proved by the author are presented. The concept of $s$-hypergraphs is introduced. $S$-hypergraphs are the correct mathematical models of mechanical structures of any assembled technical systems. Decomposition of a product into assembly units is defined as cutting of an $s$-hypergraph into $s$-subgraphs. The cutting problem is described in terms of discrete mathematical programming. Mathematical models of structural, topological and technological constraints are obtained. The objective functions are proposed that formalize the optimal choice of design solutions in various situations. The developed mathematical model of product decomposition is flexible and open. It allows for extensions that take into account the characteristics of the product and its production.

The paper is a study of the mathematical model and kinematics of a parallel spherical manipulator. This type of manipulator was proposed back in the 80s of the last century and has since found application in exoskeletons and rehabilitation robots due to its structure, which allows imitating natural joint movements of the human body.

The Parallel Spherical Manipulator is a robot with three legs and two platforms, a base platform and a mobile platform. Its legs consist of two support links that are arc-shaped. Mathematically, the manipulator can be described using two virtual pyramids that are placed on top of each other.

The paper considers two types of manipulator configurations: classical and asymmetric, and solves basic kinematic problems for each. The study shows that the asymmetric design of the manipulator has the maximum workspace, especially when the motors are mounted at the joints of the manipulator’s links inside legs.

To optimize the parameters of the parallel spherical manipulator, we introduced a metric of usable workspace volume. This metric represents the volume of the sector of the sphere in which the robot does not experience internal collisions or singular states. There are three types of singular states possible within a parallel spherical manipulator — serial, parallel, and mixed singularity. We used all three types of singularities to calculate the useful volume. In our research work, we solved the problem related to maximizing the usable volume of the workspace.

Through our research work, we found that the asymmetric configuration of the spherical manipulator maximizes the workspace when the motors are located at the articulation point of the robot leg support arms. At the same time, the parameter $\beta_1$ must be zero degrees to maximize the workspace. This allowed us to create a prototype robot in which we eliminated the use of lower links in legs in favor of a radiused rail along which the motors run. This allowed us to reduce the linear dimensions of the robot itself and gain on the stiffness of the structure.

The results obtained can be used to optimize the parameters of the parallel spherical manipulator in various industrial and scientific applications, as well as for further research of other types of parallel robots and manipulators.

The article considers the problem of the stability of the vertical position of a Maxwell pendulum during its periodic up-down movements. Two types of transition movements are considered: “stop” — occurs when the body of the pendulum in its highest position on the string (during its “standard” upward movement) stops for a moment; “two-link pendulum” — occurs when the entire thread from the body of the pendulum is selected (the lowest position of the body on the thread during its “standard” downward movement), and the body is forced to rotate relative to the thread around the point of its attachment to the body. It is shown that for any values of the pendulum parameters, this position is unstable in the sense that oscillations of the thread around the vertical of finite amplitude occur in the system for arbitrarily small initial deviations. In addition, it has been established that no shock phenomena occur during the movement of the Maxwell pendulum, and the model of this pendulum itself, with the values of its parameters often used in the literature, is incorrect according to Hadamard. In this work, it is shown that the vertical position of the pendulum threads during the indicated oscillatory movements of the body along the threads for any non-degenerate values of the parameters of the Maxwell pendulum is always unstable in the above sense. Moreover, this instability is caused precisely by transitional movements of the 2nd type. In this work, it is further shown that no jumps in speeds or accelerations (due to which shocks or “jerks” in the tension of the threads can occur) do not occur during the indicated movements of the Maxwell pendulum model under consideration. In our opinion, the “jerks” observed in the experiments are due to other reasons, for example, the technical imperfection of the instruments on which the experiments were carried out.

This paper studies minimum volume elastoplastic bodies. One part of the boundary of every reviewed body is fixed to the same space points while stresses are set for the remaining part of the boundary surface (loaded surface). The shape of the loaded surface can change in space but the limit load factor calculated based on the assumption that the bodies are filled with elastoplastic medium must not be less than a fixed value. Besides, all varying bodies are supposed to have some type of a limited volume sample manifold inside of them.

The following problem has been set: what is the maximum number of cavities (or holes in a two-dimensional case) that a minimum volume body (plate) can have under the above limitations? It is established that in order to define a mathematically correct problem, two extra conditions have to be met: the areas of the holes must be bigger than the small constant while the total length of the internal hole contour lines within the optimum figure must be minimum among the varying bodies. Thus, unlike most articles on optimum design of elastoplastic structures where parametric analysis of acceptable solutions is done with the set topology, this paper looks for the topological parameter of the design connectivity.

The paper covers the case when the load limit factor for the sample manifold is quite large while the areas of acceptable holes in the varying plates are bigger than the small constant. The arguments are brought forward that prove the Maxwell and Michell beam system to be the optimum figure under these conditions. As an example, microphotographs of the standard biological bone tissues are presented. It is demonstrated that internal holes with large areas cannot be a part of the Michell system. At the same the Maxwell beam system can include holes with significant areas. The sufficient conditions are given for the hole formation within the solid plate of optimum volume. The results permit generalization for three-dimensional elastoplastic structures.

The paper concludes with the setting of mathematical problems arising from the new problem optimally designed elastoplastic systems.

Within the framework of the actual problem of comet-asteroid danger, the physical processes causing the destruction and fragmentation of meteor bodies in the Earth’s atmosphere are numerically investigated. Based on the developed physicalmathematical models that determines the movements of space objects of natural origin in the atmosphere and their interaction with it, the fall of three, one of the largest and by some parameters unusual bolides in the history of meteoritics, are considered: Tunguska, Vitim and Chelyabinsk. Their singularity lies in the absence of any material meteorite remains and craters in the area of the alleged crash site for the first two bodies and the non-detection, as it is assumed, of the main mother body for the third body (due to the too small amount of mass of the fallen fragments compared to the estimated mass). The effect of aerodynamic loads and heat flows on these bodies are studied, which leads to intensive surface mass loss and possible mechanical destruction. The velocities of the studied celestial bodies and the change in their masses are determined from the modernized system of equations of the theory of meteoric physics. An important factor that is taken into account here is the variability of the meteorite mass entrainment parameter under the action of heat fluxes (radiation and convective) along the flight path. The process of fragmentation of meteoroids in this paper is considered within the framework of a progressive crushing model based on the statistical theory of strength, taking into account the influence of the scale factor on the ultimate strength of objects. The phenomena and effects arising at various kinematic and physical parameters of each of these bodies are revealed. In particular, the change in the ballistics of their flight in the denser layers of the atmosphere, consisting in the transition from the fall mode to the ascent mode. At the same time, the following scenarios of the event can be realized: 1) the return of the body back to outer space at its residual velocity greater than the second cosmic one; 2) the transition of the body to the orbit of the Earth satellite at a residual velocity greater than the first cosmic one; 3) at lower values of the residual velocity of the body, its return after some time to the fall mode and falling out at a considerable distance from the intended crash site. It is the implementation of one of these three scenarios of the event that explains, for example, the absence of material traces, including craters, in the case of the Tunguska bolide in the vicinity of the forest collapse. Assumptions about the possibility of such scenarios have been made earlier by other authors, and in this paper their implementation is confirmed by the results of numerical calculations.

Radiopharmaceuticals with iodine radioisotopes are now widely used in imaging and non-imaging methods of nuclear medicine. When evaluating the results of radionuclide studies of the structural and functional state of organs and tissues, parallel modeling of the kinetics of radiopharmaceuticals in the body plays an important role. The complexity of such modeling lies in two opposite aspects. On the one hand, excessive simplification of the anatomical and physiological characteristics of the organism when splitting it to the compartments that may result in the loss or distortion of important clinical diagnosis information, on the other – excessive, taking into account all possible interdependencies of the functioning of the organs and systems that, on the contrary, will lead to excess amount of absolutely useless for clinical interpretation of the data or the mathematical model becomes even more intractable. Our work develops a unified approach to the construction of mathematical models of the kinetics of radiopharmaceuticals with iodine isotopes in the human body during diagnostic and therapeutic procedures of nuclear medicine. Based on this approach, three- and four-compartment pharmacokinetic models were developed and corresponding calculation programs were created in the C⁺⁺ programming language for processing and evaluating the results of radionuclide diagnostics and therapy. Various methods for identifying model parameters based on quantitative data from radionuclide studies of the functional state of vital organs are proposed. The results of pharmacokinetic modeling for radionuclide diagnostics of the liver, kidney, and thyroid using iodine-containing radiopharmaceuticals are presented and analyzed. Using clinical and diagnostic data, individual pharmacokinetic parameters of transport of different radiopharmaceuticals in the body (transport constants, half-life periods, maximum activity in the organ and the time of its achievement) were determined. It is shown that the pharmacokinetic characteristics for each patient are strictly individual and cannot be described by averaged kinetic parameters. Within the framework of three pharmacokinetic models, “Activity–time” relationships were obtained and analyzed for different organs and tissues, including for tissues in which the activity of a radiopharmaceutical is impossible or difficult to measure by clinical methods. Also discussed are the features and the results of simulation and dosimetric planning of radioiodine therapy of the thyroid gland. It is shown that the values of absorbed radiation doses are very sensitive to the kinetic parameters of the compartment model. Therefore, special attention should be paid to obtaining accurate quantitative data from ultrasound and thyroid radiometry and identifying simulation parameters based on them. The work is based on the principles and methods of pharmacokinetics. For the numerical solution of systems of differential equations of the pharmacokinetic models we used Runge–Kutta methods and Rosenbrock method. The Hooke–Jeeves method was used to find the minimum of a function of several variables when identifying modeling parameters.