Mathematical Problems in Engineering
Volume 2012 (2012), Article ID 474282, 21 pages
http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2012/474282
Research Article

Optimal Placement of Passive Energy Dissipation Devices by Genetic Algorithms

Ji-ting Qu1,2 and Hong-nan Li3

1Faculty of Infrastructure Engineering, Dalian University of Technology, Dalian, Liaoning 116024, China
2State Key Laboratory of Structural Analysis for Industrial Equipment, Dalian University of Technology, Dalian, Liaoning 116024, China
3State Key Laboratory of Costal and Offshore Engineering, Dalian University of Technology, Dalian, Liaoning 116024, China

Received 5 October 2012; Accepted 23 November 2012

Academic Editor: Fei Kang

Copyright © 2012 Ji-ting Qu and Hong-nan Li. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Abstract

A mathematical model is proposed in this paper for locating optimal positions for passive energy dissipative dampers. Three control indices of structural responses with the storey-drift angle, storey displacement, and acceleration are taken in this model. Firstly, six combination modes of these indices are presented. On the premise that the number of dampers is fixed, this paper deals with the optimal placement of two types of passive dampers for several building models with different number of storeys and seismic ground motions at four types of sites using genetic algorithm. Secondly, two estimating indices are presented to assess the reasonable combination mode of coefficients under different conditions, which can generally express the best response control. Numerical examples are illustrated to verify the effectiveness and feasibility of the proposed mathematical model. At last, several significant conclusions are given based on numerical results.