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New Paradigms for Resilient Communities: From the Application of Resilience Concepts to the Definition of Intervention Priorities

A special issue of Applied Sciences (ISSN 2076-3417). This special issue belongs to the section "Civil Engineering".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 31 July 2025 | Viewed by 2452

Special Issue Editors

School of Engineering, University of Basilicata, 85100 Potenza, Italy
Interests: civil engineering; earthquake engineering; seismic design and analysis of structural and nonstructural components; vulnerability evaluation and retrofitting; seismic risk analysis; mitigation strategies; resilience and sustainability; experimental laboratory research and activities
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Guest Editor Assistant
Italian National Research Council—IGAG, Montelibretti, 00010 Rome, Italy
Interests: civil engineering; seismic risk; seismic resilience and risk management; decision support systems; structural reliability; reinforced concrete and masonry structures

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Following on from the appreciable success of the previous Special Issue, “New Paradigms for Resilient Communities: From the Application of Resilience Concepts to the Definition of Intervention Priorities”, this Special Issue seeks to gather together new contributions covering these important topics.

Medium- and high-intensity earthquakes are repeatedly the cause of substantial economic losses, exposing the significant of vulnerabilities of existing buildings (whether private or public or strategic), structures, and infrastructures. The social and economic losses resulting from such natural disasters are too great and are no longer acceptable. However, the principal problem still remains; the majority of buildings, structures, and infrastructures around the world requiring retrofitting interventions.

The costs to be incurred are exorbitant, and it is imperative that rigorous modeling and problem-solving approaches be used with the aim of defining clear mitigation strategies based on careful prioritization and selection of interventions. Despite recent research advances, significant improvements are still needed.

To mitigate seismic risk and reduce direct and indirect losses, governments, private individuals, insurance companies, banks, building owners, and construction professionals should operate at a variety of territorial scales. To facilitate this, accurate analytical and decision support tools are increasingly important.

All of the topics briefly described above are relevant; however, in recent years, concepts focused community resilience have taken center stage in mitigation strategies. Consequently, the seismic resilience of communities should receive greater attention in the development of seismic risk mitigation strategies.

This Special Issue calls for high-quality unpublished research works covering a variety of advanced approaches to seismic risk mitigation. Potential topics include, but are not limited to:

  • Innovative, simple, fast, readily available, and economically sustainable retrofitting strategies and optimized rules;
  • Definition of rational criteria for risk-mitigation policies;
  • Allocation of resources based on novel approaches and methods;
  • Seismic resilience approaches to risk mitigation strategies;
  • Seismic vulnerability evaluation and the retrofitting of buildings, structures, and infrastructures;
  • Structural control, monitoring, and assessment of structural damage;
  • Seismic hazard analysis;
  • Case studies.

Prof. Dr. Marco Vona
Guest Editor

Dr. Angelo Anelli
Guest Editor Assistant

Manuscript Submission Information

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Keywords

  • seismic design
  • seismic resilience
  • seismic hazard analysis

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Published Papers (2 papers)

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Research

22 pages, 3952 KiB  
Article
Seismic Site Amplification Characteristics of Makran Subduction Zone Using 1D Non-Linear Ground Response Analysis
by Hammad Raza, Naveed Ahmad, Muhammad Aaqib, Turab H. Jafri and Mohsin Usman Qureshi
Appl. Sci. 2025, 15(4), 1775; https://doi.org/10.3390/app15041775 - 10 Feb 2025
Viewed by 687
Abstract
The Makran Subduction Zone (MSZ) is a tectonic plate boundary where the Arabian Plate is subducting beneath the Eurasian Plate. This study investigated the dynamic response in the Gwadar region, located in the eastern part of the MSZ. A suite of seismic records [...] Read more.
The Makran Subduction Zone (MSZ) is a tectonic plate boundary where the Arabian Plate is subducting beneath the Eurasian Plate. This study investigated the dynamic response in the Gwadar region, located in the eastern part of the MSZ. A suite of seismic records compatible with the Building Code of Pakistan (BCP:2021) rock design spectrum was used as the input ground motions at the bedrock. The amplification characteristics were assessed through a series of one-dimensional (1D) site response analyses utilizing a non-linear (NL) approach. The results revealed significant de-amplification in soft soils at short spectral periods. A general depth-wise decrease in the shear stress ratio and peak ground acceleration values was observed, influenced by shear-strain-induced effects and shear wave velocity reversals within the site profiles. The code spectra, compared to the proposed design spectra, underestimated the site amplification for stiff soils (i.e., Site Class D) for periods of less than 0.32 s and overestimated it for soft soils (i.e., Site Class E) across all periods. These findings underscore the necessity for site-specific ground response analyses, particularly within the framework of the China–Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC). Full article
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19 pages, 4076 KiB  
Article
Preliminary Test of Source Parameters of Mwp6 Italian Earthquakes: Revisiting Kinematic Function Method
by Paolo Harabaglia, Massimiliano Iurcev, Denis Sandron, Teresa Tufaro, Marco Vona and Franco Pettenati
Appl. Sci. 2025, 15(3), 1072; https://doi.org/10.3390/app15031072 - 22 Jan 2025
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 535
Abstract
Macroseismic intensity data are the only source of information for historical earthquakes; it is therefore necessary to devise methods that allow us to retrieve as many source parameters as possible on the basis of these data. We present the inversion of macroseismic data [...] Read more.
Macroseismic intensity data are the only source of information for historical earthquakes; it is therefore necessary to devise methods that allow us to retrieve as many source parameters as possible on the basis of these data. We present the inversion of macroseismic data as a first validation of an improved version of the kinematic function, KF. Following the previous results of some earthquakes on Italian territory and several validations by Californian events provided with instrumental solutions, we have now simplified the KF by reducing some degrees of freedom of the parameters and rearranging the code for parallel calculation. This approach will allow for a more extensive application of the KF technique. We present the inversion of the macroseismic intensity pattern of the Mwp6 earthquake of 27 March 1928 (8:32 GMT), which occurred in Northeastern Italy (Carnia), and we retrieved source parameters that are compatible with the solutions of other authors who independently treat instrumental data. The 1928 event is located a few tens of kilometers west of the more destructive Mw6.5 of 6 May 1976 and northeast of the subsequent earthquake Mwp6.1 of 18 October 1936. The inversion was performed as a blind test, without prior knowledge for fault plane solutions and tectonic information; it resulted in a minimum variance model with a strike of 62°, a dip of 10°, and a rake of 101°. This solution is not consistent with the entire tectonic framework of the eastern Southalpine chain, but it is in agreement with the But-Chiarsò line. This result encourages us to test further improvements to the KF method and to treat other cases from the Italian macroseismic catalog. Full article
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