Research work undertaken in the Computational and Structural Mechanics Lab (Isobe Lab)

Abstract

We all use buildings every day. They are our homes, places of work and sources of entertainment. Naturally, therefore, maintaining the safety of a building is paramount. When buildings fail, people can die. Thankfully, most buildings do not encounter situations that put significant stress on their integrity. Stressors, when they do come, are unexpected and difficult to react to. Countries that are more prone to natural disasters are likely to be those most effected by sudden stress on buildings. Japan is a prime example of a highly developed country that is regularly exposed to natural disasters such as earthquakes, tsunamis and typhoons. These disasters can provide all sorts of pressures to a building – shaking, mass water flow, wind and large debris can all pose problems. However, little research has been conducted that might help enlighten when buildings collapse in these different situations and, thereby, how to build buildings that better resist these pressures. The problem with investigating how a building might respond to certain pressures lies in how quickly the number of factors involved increases. This means that there are extremely complex calculations with multiple scenarios needing examination. Professor Daigoro Isobe of the Faculty of Engineering, Information and Systems at the University of Tsukuba is working to tackle these problems. He and his team have many interrelated projects that revolve around building integrity in different situations.