Structural health monitoring by Lyapunov exponents of non-linear time series

In this study, structural health monitoring is pursued by collecting multi-channel measurements and by computing, directly from them, the Lyapunov exponents. The latter quantities are invariants of the dynamic system, so that their different values, associated with different time histories obtained from the same structure, denote damage. First, the problem is framed in the general theory. The structural health monitoring strategy is then formulated, with special care being devoted to its capability of localizing damage. The procedure is finally validated by using the time histories which were collected during the experimental tests on the model of a monumental arch. Copyright (c) 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.