Toward using explainable data-driven surrogate models for treating performance-based seismic design as an inverse engineering problem

This study presents a methodology to treat performance-based seismic design as an inverse engineering problem, where design parameters are directly derived to achieve specific performance objectives. By implementing explainable machine learning models, this methodology directly maps design variables and performance metrics, tackling computational inefficiencies of performance-based design. The resultant machine learning model is integrated as an evaluation function into a genetic optimization algorithm to solve the inverse problem. The developed methodology is then applied to two different inventories of steel and concrete moment frames in Los Angeles and Charleston to obtain sectional properties of frame members that minimize expected annualized seismic loss in terms of repair costs. The results show high accuracy of the surrogate models (e.g., R2> 90%) across a diverse set of building types, geometries, seismic design, and site hazard, where the optimization algorithm could identify the optimum values of members' properties for a fixed set of geometric variables, consistent with engineering principles.

Beyond development: Challenges in deploying machine learning models for structural engineering applications

Machine learning (ML)-based solutions are rapidly changing the landscape of many fields, including structural engineering. Despite their promising performance, these approaches are usually only demonstrated as proof-of-concept in structural engineering, and are rarely deployed for real-world applications. This paper aims to illustrate the challenges of developing ML models suitable for deployment through two illustrative examples. Among various pitfalls, the presented discussion focuses on model overfitting and underspecification, training data representativeness, variable omission bias, and cross-validation. The results highlight the importance of implementing rigorous model validation techniques through adaptive sampling, careful physics-informed feature selection, and considerations of both model complexity and generalizability.