MR damper optimal placement for semi-active control of buildings using an efficient multi-objective binary genetic algorithm

In order to ensure the survival of building structures during earthquake periods, induced vibrations have to be mitigated. In this regard, semi-active control of smart structures using magneto-rheological dampers is becoming an emerging technology. Improvements on vibration reduction are foreshadowed when the dampers are installed at critical locations on the building structure. In this paper, the placement of dampers is cast as a multi-objective optimization problem in the sense of minimum resultant vibration magnitudes and with a minimum number of dampers. A binary-coded genetic algorithm is employed as the optimizer owing to its computational flexibility and high performance. Simulation results are included to illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed approach on a high-rise building model subject to benchmark earthquake records.