Stochastic simulations in dynamic soil-structure interaction

This paper deals with several numerical techniques that account for random excitations and random material parameters occurring in earthquake engineering. It focuses in sequence on the influence on the structural response of the variability of the incident field using filtering theory, on the soil variability by coupling Stochastic Finite Elements, integral operators and Monte-Carlo simulation, and finally on the influence on the site response of a random building distribution using periodic simulations. In each case, practical examples are given to help illustrate the numerical techniques and to underline the importance of randomness in earthquake engineering problems.