Machine Learning for Extracting Features of Approximate Optimal Brace Locations for Steel Frames

Abstract

A method is presented for extracting features of approximate optimal brace types and locations for large-scale steel building frames. The frame is subjected to static seismic loads, and the maximum stress in the frame members is minimized under constraints on the number of braces in each story and the maximum interstory drift angle. A new formulation is presented for extracting important features of brace types and locations from the machine learning results using a support vector machine with radial basis function kernel. A nonlinear programming problem is to be solved for finding the optimal values of the components of the matrix for condensing the features of a large-scale frame to those of a small-scale frame so that the important features of the large-scale frame can be extracted from the machine learning results of the small-scale frame. It is shown in the numerical examples that the important features of a 24-story frame are successfully extracted using the machine learning results of a 12-story frame.