A neural network based modelling and sensitivity analysis of damage ratio coefficient

The level of structural damage after an earthquake can often be expressed using the damage ratio (DR) coefficient. This coefficient can be calculated using different formulas. A previously valorised new original formula for damage ratio derived for regular structures is implemented. This formula uses the structure response parameters of a single degree of freedom (SDOF) model. The structure response parameters of the SDOF model are obtained by analyzing a large number of non-linear numeric structure responses using earthquakes of different intensities as load input. In this paper, a multilayer perceptron (MLP) neural network is used to model the relationship between the structure parameters (natural period, elastic base shear capacity, post-elastic stiffness and damping) of an SDOF model and the damage ratio (DR) coefficient. The influence of the individual structure parameters on the damage level of a structure is then determined by performing a sensitivity analysis procedure on the trained MLP neural network. (C) 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.