AUTHOR=Caprili Silvia , Puncello Irene TITLE=Knowledge-Based Approach for the Structural Assessment of Monumental Buildings: Application to Case Studies JOURNAL=Frontiers in Built Environment VOLUME=Volume 5 - 2019 YEAR=2019 URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/built-environment/articles/10.3389/fbuil.2019.00052 DOI=10.3389/fbuil.2019.00052 ISSN=2297-3362 ABSTRACT=

Historical buildings are characterized by a high level of complexity due to a long realization process often resulting in an overall lack of information and in a structural behavior that is more similar to a “structural aggregate” rather than to a “single building”. The assessment of the static safety and seismic vulnerability then requires a multidisciplinary and multilevel approach including a deep and accurate preliminary knowledge phase before performing structural analyses. In the present paper, a consolidated knowledge-based procedure is presented and applied to four case studies in Italy. Interest is focused on the knowledge phase, combining critical–historical analysis to in situ architectural, geometrical, structural, material, and geotechnical aspects. The knowledge phase proves to be fundamental in understanding the structural behavior of cultural heritage, with special attention to the determination and analysis of local mechanisms and vulnerability elements and allowing to validate and give reason to numerical results.