Plenary Lectures
| Plenary Lecture 3 | Probability Density Evolution – a Unified Perspective for Engineering Reliability Analysis of Structures and Lifeline Networks |
| Date / Time | 24 September 2019, Tuesday / 09:00 - 09:40 hrs |
| Speaker | Jie Li, Distinguished Professor, College of Civil Engineering, Tongji University, Shanghai, China President of the International Association for Structural Safety and Reliability Director of the Shanghai Institute for Disaster Prevention and Relief Director of the International Joint Research Center for Engineering Reliability and Stochastic Mechanics (CERSM) |
On the basis of the principle of probability preservation and its random event description, a new kind of probability density evolution method (PDEM) has been developed by Li and Chen at the beginning of this century. The key theoretical achievement in the progress is the establish of the generalized probability density evolution equation. A number of investigations have demonstrated that the equation reveals the secret of randomness propagating in a physical system: the transition of probability density in a stochastic system definitely relies on the change of physical state of the system. By virtue of the development, a series of physically-based studies on system reliability have received extensive attention, and therefore supply a unified perspective for engineering reliability analysis of structures and lifeline networks. This paper briefly describes the theoretical foundation of probability density evolution method in view of a broad background, and a general framework for engineering reliability analysis, termed as the Physically-based Comprehensive Method (PCM), is proposed. For illustrative purposes, several cases are addressed to prove the value of the PDEM and the PCM.
