Complete Inverse Method Using Ant Colony Optimization Algorithm for Structural Parameters and Excitation Identification from Output Only Measurements

In vibration-based structural health monitoring of existing large civil structures, it is difficult, sometimes even impossible, to measure the actual excitation applied to structures. Therefore, an identification method using output-only measurements is crucial for the practical application of structural health monitoring. This paper integrates the ant colony optimization (ACO) algorithm into the framework of the complete inverse method to simultaneously identify unknown structural parameters and input time history using output-only measurements. The complete inverse method, which was previously suggested by the authors, converts physical or spatial information of the unknown input into the objective function of an optimization problem that can be solved by the ACO algorithm. ACO is a newly developed swarm computation method that has a very good performance in solving complex global continuous optimization problems. The principles and implementation procedure of the ACO algorithm are first introduced followed by an introduction of the framework of the complete inverse method. Construction of the objective function is then described in detail with an emphasis on the common situation wherein a limited number of actuators are installed on some key locations of the structure. Applicability and feasibility of the proposed method were validated by numerical examples and experimental results from a three-story building model.