Supporting Creative Configuration Design in A Computer-Aided Design Environment

A novel CAD environment to generate free form curves and artistic flowers is presented. Mathematical expressions to form 2D generatrix and complex functions to form 3D artifacts are presented as binary trees with variables or constants contained in the leafs, and various operators, including trigonometric and hyperbolic functions contained in the intermediate nodes. Using genetic algorithm to exchange or mutate a certain branch between two trees, and selecting different combinations of leaf values would produce attractive figures. MATLAB and Autodesk Inventor are used as supporting tools.