Development of complementary structural robustness metrics based on failure-induced stress redistribution. (1st September 2022) - Lorengo, Mrinaal
Highlights: Two structure and materials-independent metrics to quantify structural robustness were developed. The metrics describe the inherent coupling and load paths within a structural system. The metrics were successfully validated against prior studies in structural robustness. Abstract: We introduce two complementary metrics for evaluating structural robustness: importance and coupling. Importance measures the average stress gained by the structure given a specific member failure. Coupling measures how much stress a specific member will gain given a generic local failure. These two metrics form a two-axis analysis of the role different members play in a structure following an initial failure. Furthermore, the average of coupling and importance provides a single value by which different structures can be compared in terms of robustness. Coupling and importance are physically significant quantitative measurements which allow the analysis of individual members, types of members, and the entire structure. These metrics were validated against published studies and reached similar conclusions regarding the robustness of two framed structures. In addition, deeper insight regarding the fundamental behaviors of failure in the structure could be understood. These findings can potentially be applied widely across different structural systems as both a comparative tool, and to further understand failure mechanisms on a case-by-case basis for individual structures.