Abdoul Aziz Sandotin Coulibaly, a PhD student in Professor's Joel Conte research group, received the Best Paper Award from the Dynamics of Civil Structures Technical Division at the IMAC-XLIII Conference and Exposition on Experimental Mechanics, held Feb. 10 to 13 in Orlando, Fla. This award recognizes outstanding contributions to the field of structural dynamics.
Coulibaly’s award-winning paper, titled “LSTM-NARX as Emulator for FE Models of Nonlinear Structural Dynamic Systems: From Time-Series Input Vectors to Time-Series Output Vectors,” was co-authored by Zhen Hu, Associate Professor in the Industrial and Manufacturing Systems Engineering Department at the University of Michigan-Dearborn, and Joel Conte, Distinguished Professor in the Structural Engineering Department at UC San Diego and a co-principal investigator of UC San Diego’s NSF-funded outdoor earthquake simulator. The paper explores the use of an LSTM-based data-driven machine learning approach to map input time histories to output time histories, where the input excitation is the time history of one or more components of earthquake ground motion and the output consists of the time histories of global structural response quantities of interest (acceleration and displacement) and local structural response quantities (beam or column section curvature and local strain).
The IMAC Conference is known for its broad focus on structural dynamics, covering topics such as modeling and simulation, nonlinear dynamics, sensors, signal processing, and control. It brings together leading experts in these fields, offering a premier platform for exchanging ideas, presenting groundbreaking research, and exploring the latest advancements in structural dynamics.
Coulibaly’s recognition at the IMAC-XLIII Conference reflects his dedication and innovative research conducted in UC San Diego’s Department of Structural Engineering. In collaboration with Professors Hu and Conte, his work exemplifies the program’s commitment to advancing cutting-edge research in Structural Analysis and Dynamics through interdisciplinary research. It integrates a strong classical foundation in structural engineering and mechanics with expertise in probability, statistics, and machine learning. This achievement underscores Coulibaly’s growing reputation in structural engineering and paves the way for future significant contributions to the field.
Congratulations to Coulibaly, Professor Hu, and Professor Conte on this outstanding achievement!