Dr. Laura Gioiella is currently an Assistant Professor in Structural Engineering at the School of Architecture and Desing of the University of Camerino (Italy). She teaches the course of Structural Problems in the Architectonical Restoration of Cultural Heritage, and in the past, she taught for few years the course of Earthquake Engineering. Most of her academic efforts focus on the control of the seismic response of both new and existing buildings with passive systems. Her research interests span various areas, such as the risk assessment of buildings at local and territorial scale, the design of furnishing systems with life-saving function and the reliability assessment of existing post-tensioned concrete bridges developed within the activities of the FABRE Consortium (Research consortium for the evaluation and monitoring of bridges, viaducts and other structures), is presented. Apart from her academic activities, Laura is passionate about volleyball and Opera.
The focus of this presentation revolves around the Seismic risk assessment and mitigation strategies that are mainly influenced by the consciousness that Italy is a territory prone to seismic hazard and characterized by an ancient cultural heritage. Nevertheless, it is quite frequent that retrofit interventions are promoted only after the occurrence of natural hazards, therefore operating in reaction terms rather than prevention terms. Based on this awareness the main topic of the research is represented by the study and application of passive control systems for the response of buildings in seismic conditions. Moreover, where it is not possible to immediately enhance the structural capacity of existing strategic buildings, like schools that are places where children and young people are hosted during their training years, the attention is focused on the realization of intelligent furnishing systems with life-saving function. The presentation includes also the topic related to the empirical methods for loss/vulnerability models at territorial scale (schools and churches) with tools for the evaluation of post-earthquake scenarios.