Structural Identification and Monitoring based on Uncertain/Limited Information

Institute of Structural Engineering, Department of Civil, Environmental and Geomatic Engineering, ETH Zürich

^a Corresponding author: chatzi@ibk.baug.ethz.ch

Abstract

The goal of the present study is to propose a structural identification framework able to exploit both vibrational response and operational condition information in extracting structural models, able to represent the systemspecific structural behavior in its complete operational spectrum. In doing so, a scheme need be derived for the extraction of salient features, which are indicative of structural condition. Such a scheme should account for variations attributed to operational effects, such as environmental and operational load variations, and which likely lie within regular structural condition bounds, versus variations which indicate short- or long-term damage effects. The latter may be achieved via coupling of sparse, yet diverse, monitoring information with appropriate stochastic tools, able to infer the underlying dependences between the monitored input and output data. This in turn allows for extraction of quantities, or features, relating to structural condition, which may further be utilized as performance indicators. The computational tool developed herein for realizing such a framework, termed the PCE-ICA scheme, is based on the use of Polynomial Chaos Expansion (PCE) tool, along with an Independent Component Analysis (ICA) algorithm. The benefits of additionally fusing a data-driven system model will further be discussed for the case of complex structural response. The method is assessed via implementation on field data acquired from diverse structural systems, namely a benchmark bridge case study and a wind turbine tower structure, revealing a robust condition assessment tool.