Energy harvesting and power management of wireless sensors for structural control applications in civil engineering

Casciati, Sara,Faravelli, Lucia,Chen, Zhicong Techno-Press 2012 Smart Structures and Systems, An International Jou Vol.10 No.3

The authors' research efforts recently led to the development of a customized wireless control unit which receives the real-time feedbacks from the sensors, and elaborates the consequent control signal to drive the actuator(s). The controller is wireless in performing the data transmission task, i.e., it receives the signals from the sensors without the need of installing any analogue cable connection between them, but it is powered by wire. The actuator also needs to be powered by wire. In this framework, the design of a power management unit is of interest only for the wireless sensor stations, and it should be adaptable to different kind of sensor requirements in terms of voltage and power consumption. In the present paper, the power management efficiency is optimized by taking into consideration three different kinds of accelerometers, a load cell, and a non-contact laser displacement sensor. The required voltages are assumed to be provided by a power harvesting solution where the energy is stored into a capacitor.

Experimental studies on the fatigue life of shape memory alloy bars

Casciati, Sara,Marzi, Alessandro Techno-Press 2010 Smart Structures and Systems, An International Jou Vol.6 No.1

The potential offered by the thermo-mechanical properties of shape memory alloys (SMA) in structural engineering applications has been the topic of many research studies during the last two decades. The main issues concern the long-term predictability of the material behaviour and the fatigue lifetime of the macro structural elements (as different from the one of wire segments). The laboratory tests reported in this paper are carried out on bar specimens and they were planned in order to pursue two objectives. First, the creep phenomenon is investigated for two different alloys, a classical Ni-Ti alloy and a Cu-based alloy. The attention is then focused on the Cu-based alloy only and its fatigue characteristics at given temperatures are investigated. Stress and thermal cycles are alternated to detect any path dependency.

Experimental and numerical studies toward the implementation of shape memory alloy ties in masonry structures

Casciati, Sara,Hamdaoui, Karim Techno-Press 2008 Smart Structures and Systems, An International Jou Vol.4 No.2

The use of pre-tensioned shape memory alloy (SMA) wires to retrofit historic masonry structures is investigated. A small wall, serving as a prototype masonry specimen, is constructed to undergo a series of shaking-table tests. It is first studied in its original state, and its dynamic characteristics (in terms of modal frequencies) are extracted from the recorded signals. The results are then compared with those obtained when an increasing number of couples of pre-stressed SMA wires are introduced in the specimen to link the bricks together. A three-dimensional finite element model of the specimen is developed and calibrated according to the modal parameters identified from each experimental test (with and without SMA wires). The calibration process is conducted by enhancing the masonry mechanical behaviour. The results and the effectiveness of the approach are presented.

Statistical approach to a SHM benchmark problem

Casciati, Sara Techno-Press 2010 Smart Structures and Systems, An International Jou Vol.6 No.1

The approach to damage detection and localization adopted in this paper is based on a statistical comparison of models built from the response time histories collected at different stages during the structure lifetime. Some of these time histories are known to have been recorded when the structural system was undamaged. The consistency of the models associated to two different stages, both undamaged, is first recognized. By contrast, the method detects the discrepancies between the models from measurements collected for a damaged situation and for the undamaged reference situation. The damage detection and localization is pursued by a comparison of the SSE (sum of the squared errors) histograms. The validity of the proposed approach is tested by applying it to the analytical benchmark problem developed by the ASCE Task Group on Structural Health Monitoring (SHM). In the paper, the results of the benchmark studies are presented and the performance of the method is discussed.

Energy harvesting and power management of wireless sensors for structural control applications in civil engineering

Sara Casciati,Zhicong Chen,Lucia Faravelli 국제구조공학회 2012 Smart Structures and Systems, An International Jou Vol.10 No.3

The authors’ research efforts recently led to the development of a customized wireless control unit which receives the real-time feedbacks from the sensors, and elaborates the consequent control signal to drive the actuator(s). The controller is wireless in performing the data transmission task, i.e., it receives the signals from the sensors without the need of installing any analogue cable connection between them, but it is powered by wire. The actuator also needs to be powered by wire. In this framework, the design of a power management unit is of interest only for the wireless sensor stations, and it should be adaptable to different kind of sensor requirements in terms of voltage and power consumption. In the present paper, the power management efficiency is optimized by taking into consideration three different kinds of accelerometers, a load cell, and a non-contact laser displacement sensor. The required voltages are assumed to be provided by a power harvesting solution where the energy is stored into a capacitor.

Synergy of monitoring and security

Sara Casciati,Zhi Cong Chen,Lucia Faravelli,Michele Vece 국제구조공학회 2016 Smart Structures and Systems, An International Jou Vol.17 No.5

An ongoing research project is devoted to the design and implementation of a satellite based asset tracking for supporting emergency management in crisis operations. Due to the emergency environment, one has to rely on a low power consumption wireless communication. Therefore, the communication hardware and software must be designed to match requirements, which can only be foreseen at the level of more or less likely scenarios. The latter aspect suggests a deep use of a simulator (instead of a real network of sensors) to cover extreme situations. The former power consumption remark suggests the use of a minimal computer (Raspberry Pi) as data collector.

Experimental studies on the fatigue life of shape memory alloy bars

Sara Casciati,Alessandro Marzi 국제구조공학회 2010 Smart Structures and Systems, An International Jou Vol.6 No.1

The potential offered by the thermo-mechanical properties of shape memory alloys (SMA) in structural engineering applications has been the topic of many research studies during the last two decades. The main issues concern the long-term predictability of the material behaviour and the fatigue lifetime of the macro structural elements (as different from the one of wire segments). The laboratory tests reported in this paper are carried out on bar specimens and they were planned in order to pursue two objectives. First, the creep phenomenon is investigated for two different alloys, a classical Ni-Ti alloy and a Cu-based alloy. The attention is then focused on the Cu-based alloy only and its fatigue characteristics at given temperatures are investigated. Stress and thermal cycles are alternated to detect any path dependency.

Statistical approach to a SHM benchmark problem

Sara Casciati 국제구조공학회 2010 Smart Structures and Systems, An International Jou Vol.6 No.1

The approach to damage detection and localization adopted in this paper is based on a statistical comparison of models built from the response time histories collected at different stages during the structure lifetime. Some of these time histories are known to have been recorded when the structural system was undamaged. The consistency of the models associated to two different stages, both undamaged, is first recognized. By contrast, the method detects the discrepancies between the models from measurements collected for a damaged situation and for the undamaged reference situation. The damage detection and localization is pursued by a comparison of the SSE (sum of the squared errors) histograms. The validity of the proposed approach is tested by applying it to the analytical benchmark problem developed by the ASCE Task Group on Structural Health Monitoring (SHM). In the paper, the results of the benchmark studies are presented and the performance of the method is discussed.

Experimental and numerical studies toward the implementation of shape memory alloy ties in masonry structures

Sara Casciati,Karim Hamdaoui 국제구조공학회 2008 Smart Structures and Systems, An International Jou Vol.4 No.2

The use of pre-tensioned shape memory alloy (SMA) wires to retrofit historic masonry structures is investigated. A small wall, serving as a prototype masonry specimen, is constructed to undergo a series of shakingtable tests. It is first studied in its original state, and its dynamic characteristics (in terms of modal frequencies) are extracted from the recorded signals. The results are then compared with those obtained when an increasing number of couples of pre-stressed SMA wires are introduced in the specimen to link the bricks together. A threedimensional finite element model of the specimen is developed and calibrated according to the modal parameters identified from each experimental test (with and without SMA wires). The calibration process is conducted by enhancing the masonry mechanical behaviour. The results and the effectiveness of the approach are presented.

Experimental characterization of a smart material via DIC

Sara Casciati,Daniele Bortoluzzi,Lucia Faravelli,Luca Rosadini 국제구조공학회 2022 Smart Structures and Systems, An International Jou Vol.30 No.3

When no extensometer is available in a generic tensile-compression test carried out by a universal testing machine (for instance the model BIONIX from Material Testing Systems (MTS)), the test results only provide the relative displacement between the machine grips. The test does not provide any information on the local behaviour of the material. This contribution presents the potential of an application of Digital Image Correlation (DIC) toward the reconstruction of the behaviour along the specimen. In particular, the authors test a Ni-Ti shape memory alloys (SMA) specimen with emphasis on the coupling of the two measurement techniques.