Intelligent Computational Methods for Optimal Distribution of Friction Dampers in Seismic Protection of Buildings

Seismic protection of multi-story buildings using friction dampers (FDs) is a cheap and effective passive structural control solution. For optimization of system response, optimal distribution of FDs between floors is required, which is a challenging problem. In this paper, we propose novel intelligent computational methods based on reinforcement learning for the distribution of <tex-math notation="LaTeX">n</tex-math> FDs for <tex-math notation="LaTeX">m</tex-math> -story buildings. In order to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed methods, a case study of optimally distributing 16 FDs in a 3-story building is considered, and the results are compared with the optimal solution found from a statistical analysis based on a large number of earthquake accelerations.