Bridge Damping Research

I think I have learned enough to try and explain what type of research we are conducting here in South Korea. Our group, consisting of three undergraduate students including myself representing Univ of Connecticut, Ben Davis representing Univ of South Carolina and Abby Hurley from Univ of Akron, Ohio is researching how to harvest energy from the ambient vibrations in cable stay bridges. Close to the anchor points at each end of an individual cable on a bridge has a damping device called a Magneto-rheological(MR)Damper which currently is powered by an external source of electricity. These MR Dampers act as a means to reduce the vibrations in the cables by pushing on the cable in one direction as the wind pushes the cable in the opposite direction. There are other excitations which cause the vibrations such as traffic from cars, trucks, even pedestrian traffic can cause a frequency vibration. As the cable vibrates, there are sensors which send a signal through a control device telling the damper how much force to push or pull reducing the cable vibration. In our daily lectures, there have been several examples given of bridge failure due to these vibrations caused by wind or traffic loading forces. One such example was the Tacoma Narrows Bridge which collapsed under a 42 mph wind in 1940. Watch the vibrations by clicking Tacoma Narrows Bridge With my lack of knowledge from not having a class in structural dynamics and the computer programming class called Mat Lab (this coming year when I return), I have been assigned the task of collecting pertinent information from published technical journal articles relating to MR Dampers in preparation to an introduction and general overview for the beginning of our research paper. So far the three of us have collected 22 related journal articles of which I am sifting through and collecting text for future writing and documentation. My other two team members have been self delegated the computer programming aspects of the project which involves...I have no clue what this involves...maybe I will be able to answer this question toward the end of the summer. The short two hour lectures covering MatLab and Structural Dynamics given here at KAIST (Korean Advanced Institute of Science and Technology) would normally be taught in a semester long class. Having no prior introduction, I may compare this to trying to learn the fundamentals of a new language within the same time period. While bicycling around the city this past Monday, I rode 10.5 km one way to a traditional Korean market with fresh seafood both live and on ice, many fresh vegetables and 30 varieties of kimchi. With the somewhat popularity of dog meat, I half-way expected to see dog carcass hanging amongst other large cuts of meat. The meat vendors had only family size packages of a variety of cuts. There may have been dog meat there but all the signs were illegible to me being in the Korean language. On the return trip, a came across a Korean couple who I had passed hearing the guy speaking broken English. They were on their bikes traveling much slower. Out of curiosity, I turned around to talk with someone outside of the KAIST. As we talked, I asked him of points of interest within an hours radius by bike from the university. When he asked about me, I told him I was studying/researching at KAIST. He said I must be really smart as the university is very prestigious and is in the top ten engineering research institutions in the world. Seoul was a wonderful trip this past weekend as we saw a Royal Palace in the city center and a night view of the city atop a mountain overlook with a skytower on the top. This coming weekend we are going to Busan, on the southern coast. Busan is the second largest city in South Korea and hosts the largest fish market in the country. I read a restaurant review today of ordering baby octopus as an appetizer. Apparently the octopus is served still squiggling on the plate prior to consumption. I may have to try this.