This page created by S. J. Dyke December 28, 1999.  Last updated: July 19, 2003.

The primary objective of this task group is to address fundamental issues for health monitoring using structural response data that are needed to improve its effectiveness in detecting, locating and assessing damage produced by severe loading events and by progressive environmental deterioration. At the 1996 International Workshop on Structural Control (Chen, 1996), a plan was formed to create task groups to study the problem of structural health monitoring. Three task groups one per region (Europe, Asia, US) were to be formed. The US task group solidified in 1999 jointly under the auspices of the International Association for Structural Control (IASC) and the Dynamics committee of the ASCE Engineering Mechanics Division, with Prof. James L. Beck (Caltech) as chair. This joint IASC-ASCE task group met first in June 1999 at the 13th ASCE Engineering Mechanics Conference at Johns Hopkins University. The task group is charged with studying the efficacy of various structural health monitoring methods. Several meetings have been held over the last few years. The current chair of the task group is Prof. Erik Johnson. The IASC-ASCE SHM Task Group has developed a series of benchmark Structural Health Monitoring problems, beginning with a relatively simple problem and proceeding on to more realistic and more challenging problems. This site describes the task group activities. The benchmark problems proposed by the committee are contained herein, as well as recent papers and reports on the members research activities. The activities of the task force are partially supported by the American Society of Civil Engineers.