Making future buildings safer

The capacity to realistically test the integrity of new materials and structures such as buildings, bridges and even airframes has been boosted thanks to a new Smart Structures Laboratory at Swinburne University of Technology.

The laboratory houses Australia's first hybrid testing facility (HTF) state-of-the-art technology, which integrates what is happening to a physical model being stress-tested with a virtual model of the whole structure in which it would be a component. This allows researchers to build real-time profiles of the complex structural relationships that determine a building's capacity to withstand extreme forces.

The new laboratory's director Professor Riadh Al-Mahaidi, an international leader in the field of bridge engineering, said the technology would open up the way for the next generation of construction materials to be thoroughly tested and provide industry and consumers with the necessary level of confidence in performance and safety.

The other team members assembled to run the facility have been drawn from key fields of expertise: Professor John Wilson, earthquake engineering, Professor Emad Gad, structural engineering, and Professor Jay Sanjayan, geopolymers.

Professor Sanjayan will be using the HTF to demonstrate to industry advances in geopolymers, which are manufactured from industrial wastes such as fly ash, slag and waste glass, and their potential as an alternative to cement.

''Conventional cement has been around for over 100 years, so there is a natural hesitation to use something new,'' he said. ''This facility will help us demonstrate geopolymers are not only better environmentally, but also have improved structural properties.''