Ricerc@Sapienza

The present research project is aimed at developing a novel approach to the assessment of the damage produced by major earthquakes to strategic infrastructural systems. In this approach, a limited number of specific instruments are installed at carefully selected locations. The decision about the type and location of the measuring devices originates directly from the results of non-linear dynamic analysis of numerical models that describe with good accuracy the mechanical response of the system under examination.
The infrastructural elements considered in this project are those that present distinctive interaction with the subsoil, namely, large earth dams, major tunnels, and large bridges, limiting in this last case the study to a damage related to the soil-structure interaction for the foundation and the abutments.
Note that this is different from the common definition of a dynamic structural monitoring, as the scope is not the evaluation of the dynamic behaviour of the system structure under low-intensity motions: the objective is to evaluate directly and rapidly the actual damage produced by a major event, to assist a decision about the integrity and operability of the system. Therefore, it can be anticipated that in the selection of the measuring devices, static measurements will be preferred to dynamic ones, and that the robustness of the instrument will be the preferential selective criterion, in addition to its accuracy, while the potential to generate automatic measurements does not appear particularly advantageous.