NIKER · NEW INTEGRATED KNOWLEDGE BASED APPROACHES TO THE PROTECTION OF CULTURAL HERITAGE FROM EARTHQUAKE-INDUCED RISK

The project tackles the problem of earthquake-impact on Cultural Heritage assets starting from basic consideration that efficient protection, with substantial guarantee of compatibility and low-intrusivity, can only be achieved with ‘minimum intervention’ approach. This requires that potentialities of existing materials and components are as much as possible exploited in terms of strength and energy dissipation, and candidate interventions are validated and optimized on specific, real application conditions. At the project start, earthquake-induced failure mechanisms, construction types and materials, intervention and assessment techniques will be cross-correlated with the aim of developing new integrated methodologies with a systemic approach. Traditional materials will be enhanced by innovative industrial processes (e.g., nano-limes or micro-silica for injection), and new high-performance (e.g. dissipative) elements will be developed. Novel collaborative combinations of them will be tested on structural components (walls, pillars, floors, vaults) and on structural connections (wall-, floor- and roof-to-wall), which converge the behaviour of single strengthened elements into the global structural response. The envisaged techniques will be also validated on model buildings and substructures. Advanced numerical studies will allow parameterizing the results and deriving simple and optimized design procedures. Early warning techniques for intelligent interventions and advanced monitoring techniques for knowledge based assessment and progressive implementation of interventions will be also developed. This bottom-up approach will bring to new integrated materials, technologies and tools for systemic improvement of seismic behaviour of CH assets. The new solutions will be condensed into guidelines for end-users. The large participation of research centres, SME, and end-user from various countries, including ICPC and MPC, ensures increased impact of the research.