Homogenization and Seismic Assessment: Review and Recent Trends

The mechanics of masonry structures has been for long underdeveloped in comparison with other fields of knowledge. Presently, non-linear analysis is a popular field in masonry research and advanced computer codes are available for researchers and practitioners. The chapter presents a discussion of masonry behaviour and clarifies how to obtain the non-linear data required by the computations. The chapter also addresses different homogenisation techniques available in the literature in the linear and rigid-plastic case, aiming at defining a catalogue and at discussing the advantages and disadvantages of the different approaches. Special attention is given to stress assumed models based either on a polynomial expansion of the micro-stress field or in the discretization of the unit cell by means of a few constant stress finite elements CST with joints reduced to interfaces. Finally, the aspects of seismic assessment are presented and case studies involving the use of macro-block analysis, static (pushover) analysis and time integration analysis are discussed.