Biography:
Bradley Rothenberg is the CEO & founder of nTopology, a startup developing Generative-Functional CAD software based in New York City. Prior to founding nTopology, Bradley graduated with honors studying Architecture at Pratt University in Brooklyn, New York. Brad has been developing computational design tools for advanced manufacturing for 10+ years.
Talk Abstract: Generative Design – Functional Modelling:
Functional modelling, or the idea of features being stateless is not a new paradigm, however it has yet to be applied to mechanical CAD. For the last 30 or so years, Feature based modelling has allowed us to model with a limited set of parametric traits: mainly geometric constraints. Generative being the next paradigm for MCAD presents an opportunity to now make everything parametric — from how you locate a point, to how you map a lattice to a surface. For this to work, however, each function needs to be independent & stateless, that is, for a set of inputs it will produce one set of outputs. Linking a number of these functions together can allow the “modelling” of a part or the definition of an assembly.