Structural Assessment and Repair of Superelastic-Shape-Memory-Alloy Reinforced-Concrete Framed Structures Following Exposure to Seismic and/or Fire Events

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

The demand to build resilient structures that can be easily retrofitted after experiencing natural and/or man-made disasters is increasing. Recent disasters have shown that significant structural damage and severe economic losses can be experienced in developed countries, where state-of-the-art codes and standards are being enforced. Given that Canada's climate is changing, which is expected to increase the frequency and magnitude of natural disasters, research addressing disaster-resilient structures is highly needed. Our structures need to be designed to expect the unexpected while suffering minimum amount of repairable damage. This proposal provides the means to achieve this goal considering two potential disasters: earthquake and fire events. Dr. Youssef's unique expertise in structural fire engineering, earthquake engineering, and applications of superelastic shape memory alloy (SMA) bars will be utilized to conduct an original research program, which leads to structures resilient to fire and seismic events. Utilization of SMA bars to minimize seismic damage in civil structures has been proposed by Dr. Youssef and other researchers. However, the performance of such structures during fire events was not investigated, which is a critical safety issue. The short-term research will focus on SMA Reinforced Concrete (RC) framed structures and address two potential scenarios: (1) the SMA RC structure has been damaged by a fire event, which requires engineers to assess its safety, make the critical decision about the need for evacuation, and design a suitable retrofitting system that can withstand future loads including seismic activities, (2) the SMA RC structure has been damaged by an earthquake, and, then exposed to the commonly erupting fires, which follow and known to impose high risk to occupants and emergency personnel. The proposed research will provide researchers and engineers with a complete set of experimental data that cover material properties, structural performance of fire-damaged SMA RC elements before and after retrofitting, and fire resiliency of seismically-damaged SMA RC joints. The developed numerical tools will bridge the gap between the traditional prescriptive design and the recently adopted objective-based design in Canada and performance-based design in USA while ensuring public safety. Engineers will be able to design retrofit systems for fire-damaged SMA RC structures that ascertain future resiliency, and to consider fire resiliency while conducting seismic design. The proposed research will provide a unique opportunity for 3 PhD candidates, 2 MESc candidates, 5 undergraduate-research students, and 12 undergraduate-work-study students to be the engineers of the future. They will be equipped with unique abilities allowing them to deal with multi-hazards through experimental and/or numerical investigations. Their knowledge, abilities, and skills will allow them to shine in academia and/or consulting activities.