Sarah Bobby

SmartSync: An Integrated Real-Time Structural Health Monitoring and Structural Identification System for Tall Buildings

AbstractThis study introduces a unique prototype system for structural health monitoring (SHM), SmartSync, which uses the building’s existing Internet backbone as a system of virtual instrumentation cables to permit modular and largely plug-and-play deployments. Within this framework, data streams from distributed heterogeneous sensors are pushed through network interfaces in real time and seamlessly synchronized and aggregated by a centralized server, which performs basic data acquisition, event triggering, and database management while also providing an interface for data visualization and analysis that can be securely accessed. The system enables a scalable approach to monitoring tall and complex structures that can readily interface a variety of sensors and data formats (analog and digital) and can even accommodate variable sampling rates. This study overviews the SmartSync system, its installation/operation in the world’s tallest building, Burj Khalifa, and proof-of-concept in triggering under dual e...

A Performance-Based Methodology for the Topology Design of Tall Buildings

Topology optimization methods have recently been used as a tool for conceptual tall building design. These techniques were originally developed in a deterministic setting despite the inherently uncertain nature of the real-world environment. If uncertainties are neglected during the design process there is a possibility that the final constructed designs may perform unsatisfactorily. Thus it is necessary to account for uncertainties affecting the problem, including stochastic environmental loads and time-invariant uncertainties. Furthermore, the dynamically sensitive nature of tall buildings must be considered during the design process. This paper presents a methodology for the topology optimization of tall buildings in this setting using a framework based on the PEER Equation. A novel decoupling approach is developed that defines approximate sub-problems that can be solved using established topology optimization techniques. The successive resolution of the sub-problems until convergence results in an optimal design that satisfies the original performance constraints. A case study is used to demonstrate the validity of this framework.

Topology optimization for buildings in seismic zones within a pbee framework

This paper presents a probabilistic performance-based topology optimization framework for the conceptual design of uncertain building systems in seismic zones. The stochastic nature of the ground motions is rigorously considered in a simulation-based probabilistic performance assessment framework that allows for the definition of a novel decoupling technique that efficiently separates the probabilistic analysis from the optimization loop. In particular, the methodology is based on the construction of a series of approximate sub-problems with simplified governing equations, which conveniently allows their evaluation using established techniques for static, deterministic topology optimization problems. The applicability and efficiency of the method is demonstrated on a case study.