Semi-active direct control of civil structure seismic responses using magneto-rheological dampers

As building structures frequently collapse and cause losses of lives and properties, due to excessive vibrations induced during earthquake periods, it is crucial to reduce the structural vibrations. This paper develops a Lyapunov-based controller for Magnetorheological (MR) dampers embedded in building structures to mitigate quake-induced vibrations. In this work, MR dampers are used as semi-active devices, taking the advantages of the fail-safe operation and low power requirement. To enhance the system performance, a Lyapunov-based controller is proposed here for direct control of the supply currents of the MR dampers placed in a multi-storey building. The effectiveness of the proposed technique is verified in simulation by using a ten-storey building model subject to quake-like excitations.