Patent ID: 8165856

Claim:
A method of determining a list of neighbor elements of an element in a grid model, which is used in a computer aided engineering analysis for assisting a user to improve engineering product design, the method comprising: receiving, in a computer system, a grid model having a plurality of nodes connected by a plurality of elements; designating one of the elements as a base element; defining a region containing potential neighbors for the base element, wherein the region comprises a space characterized by respective sets of upper and lower bounds in each dimension of the space, wherein each set of the upper and lower bounds is configured to correlate to a characteristic length centered at a representative node of said base element; creating a group of potential neighbors of said base element by including those of the elements located within the region; determining a list of neighbor elements by including only those elements that fit a predefined neighborhood definition from the group of potential neighbors, whereby the list of neighbor elements of said base element is used in conjunction with the grid model in a computer aided engineering analysis for assisting a user to improve engineering product design.