Patent ID: 7725283

Claim:
A method for calibrating a physical test cell, the method comprising: determining a set of inputs to be provided to the physical test cell based in part on a set of historical test data; providing the inputs to the physical test cell and receiving a set of outputs associated therewith, wherein the providing includes implementing a sequential space filling sampling procedure to substantially cover a region defined by the set of historical values; creating a virtual test cell comprising one or more response surfaces based on the set of outputs, wherein creating the virtual test cell includes storing instructions within a computer-readable medium, the instructions being configured to cause a processor to produce a virtual test cell output based on a virtual test cell input and the one or more response surfaces; and interrogating the virtual test cell to determine a calibration relationship between at least one of the inputs and at least one of the outputs, wherein the interrogating includes providing a set of test points to the virtual test cell and receiving a set of virtual test cell outputs corresponding to the set of test points on the one or more response surfaces.