Abstract:
Earthquakes have always been a source of damage and destruction with the potential to cause the loss of life. As we have advanced technologically, we have developed techniques to help protect ourselves during these events but every so often we find that our solutions are not as effective as we hoped. Such was the case in the mid 1990s where earthquakes in California and Kobe highlighted a lack of understanding in how the steel in large scale structures behaves during these events. As a result of this finding, new research has been carried out to further improve the safety of our structures. This dissertation details work carried out at the University of Auckland.