US-Portugal International Workshop on Earthquake Engineering Research Using NEES Facilities, CMS proposal 0410598 PI: Pedro Silva, U. Missouri-Rolla
The main plan for this proposal is to assemble a team of U.S. and Portuguese researchers that will actively participate in an international workshop to be held in Portugal. This international workshop will focus on establishing research partnerships between U.S. and Portuguese scientists in the field of earthquake engineering research. These research partnerships will be established within the George E. Brown, Jr. Network for Earthquake Engineering Simulation (NEES) collaborative goals, which emphasize shared use and timely access to research data. In particular it is expected that these research partnerships will lead to the formulation of Grand Challenge (GC) NEESR projects among international collaborators.
A new era in earthquake engineering research is upon us. Today the George E. Brown, Jr. Network for Earthquake Engineering Research (NEES) is attempting to revolutionize earthquake-engineering research to a more predominant multidisciplinary, multi-institutional and worldwide collaboration. Under NEES, 16-research equipment sites are currently in the final stages of construction and are geographically distributed around the U.S. An important feature of these NEES research facilities is the teleobservation and teleoperation capabilities, which allows researchers at different locations to observe and operate the same physical test at one site. This feature of teleconferencing can benefit the exchange of information between institutions, while simultaneously expanding the experimental capability of many research institutions. NEES equipment portfolio for improving the seismic design and performance of the U.S. civil and mechanical systems will have a significant impact on education and training of the next-generation engineers. Under NEES these research facilities will be open to a large number of researchers for conducting research in the field of earthquake engineering. This without a doubt will propel the field of earthquake engineering research to new horizons.
The goal for establishing NEES was to provide a national and international resource that will shift the emphasis of earthquake engineering research from current reliance on physical testing to integrated experimentation, computation, theory, databases, and model-based simulation. Over the next 10 years, and starting in 2004, another main goal of the NEES consortium is to add other research facilities in the US and around the world. In line with this goal; the main objective of the proposed international workshop is to develop research ties between researchers from the U.S. and Portugal. Participants in this international workshop will comprise of U.S. and Portuguese researchers in the field of seismic design of civil infrastructures. The PI expects to assemble a team of 10 researchers from the U.S. and an equal number from Portugal.
