An Uncertainty Analysis on Finite Difference Time-Domain Computations with Artificial Neural Networks: Improving accuracy while maintaining low computational costs

Artificial neural networks (ANNs) have appeared as a potential alternative for uncertainty quantification (UQ) in the finite difference time-domain (FDTD) computation. They are applied to build a surrogate model for the computation-intensive FDTD simulation and to bypass the numerous simulations required for UQ. However, when the surrogate model utilizes an ANN, a considerable number of data are generally required for high accuracy, and generating such large quantities of data becomes computationally prohibitive. To address this drawback, a number of adaptations for ANNs are proposed, which additionally improves the accuracy of ANNs in UQ for the FDTD computation while maintaining a low computational cost. The proposed algorithm is tested for application in bioelectromagnetics, and considerable speed up, as well as the improved accuracy of UQ, is observed compared to traditional methods such as the nonintrusive polynomial chaos (NIPC) method.