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Prof. Christian Bucher

Responsibilities

Prof. Bucher is Professor of Structural Mechanics at the Vienna University of Technology. He is involved in a variety of teaching at the bachelors and masters level in addition to supervising doctoral students.

Teaching: Mechanics, Basics of stochastic mechanics, Structural Optimization

Research Interests

• Stochastic mechanics
• Structural dynamics and Probabilistic deterioration models
• Structural reliability analysis
• Numerical modelling
• Structural stochasticity
• Inverse parameter identification
• Stochastic finite element analysis

Recent research has focussed on various aspects of stochastic mechanics, in particular structural dynamics and risk-related problems. This covers issues of optimal maintenance planning for structures in the context of probabilistic deterioration models (Bucher and Frangopol, 2006). Also, the development of improved approximation methods for the fast computation of structural failure probabilities is an important focus of research (Bucher and Most, 2007). These developments result in software development for reliability analysis with a broad application area.

Non-destructive structural assessment is another area of investigation and provides a connection between theoretical methods and practical application. A laboratory-based study on R/C beams is documented by Ebert and Bucher (2002ab). Here the focus was on a suitable representation of the stochasticity found in the experiment by random field models for concrete properties. Specific aspects of identification procedures in structural dynamics were discussed by Bucher et al. (2003). Related experiences with damage detection on bridges based on dynamic experiments are reported in (Bucher and Zabel, 2005).
 

Key Facts

Prof. Christian Bucher took a Diploma in Civil Engineering (1982), and a Doctorate (1986) and a Habilitation in Engineering Mechanics (1989) at the University of Innsbruck. From 1994 to 2007 he was a Professor of Structural Dynamics at the Bauhaus-University Weimar, and from 1997 - 2007 he was the Head of the Institute of Structural Mechanics. From 1999 to 2006 he was also Chairman of the Collaborative Research Centre SFB 524 “Materials and Structures for the Revitalization of Buildings” at the Bauhaus-University of Weimar. Since 2001 he has been a Founding Partner of the DYNARDO (Dynamic Software and Engineering) company in Weimar. In 2007 he was appointed Professor of Structural Mechanics at the Vienna University of Technology.

His international experience includes appointments as a research associate in Kyoto (1984), and as a visiting fellow in New York (1986) and Boca Raton, Florida (1987 - 1988). As a visiting professor he collaborated with the Polish Academy of Science of Warsaw, Poland (2003), with the University of Tokyo, Japan (2004), with the University of Colorado, Boulder, (2004), and with the University of Waterloo, Ontario (2005).

Christian Bucher has been awarded the Science Award of the City of Innsbruck in 1989, the “Junior Research Prize 1993” of the International Association for Structural Safety and Reliability (IASSAR), the European Academic Software Award (1994) and the Charles E. Schmidt Distinguished Visiting Professorship at Florida Atlantic University (2003). He has been involved in numerous professional committees: IASSAR, Subcommittee on Stochastic Structural Dynamics, from 1986; WTG, Committee Aerodynamics of Buildings, from 1989; IASSAR, Subcommittee on Computational Stochastic Mechanics, from 1994; CERRA, German Representative on the Board of Directors, between 1999 and 2007; JCSS, Joint Committee on Structural Safety, between 2001 and 2007; DIBt, Committee on Numerical Procedures, from 2004 and IFIP Working Group 7.5 on Reliability and Optimization of Structural Systems from 2005. He is also member in the editorial boards of the following scientific journals: Structure and Infrastructure Engineering, International Journal of Reliability and Safety, Probabilistic Engineering Mechanics.