Special Issue of the IEEE Control Systems Magazine on Emerging Technology Controlling Buildings: A New Frontier in Feedback1

The protection of civil structures, including their material con-tents and human occupants, is without doubt a world-wide pri-ority of the most serious current importance. Such protection may range from reliable operation and comfort, on the one hand, to survivability on the other. Examples of such structures leap to one’s mind, and include buildings, offshore rigs, towers, roads, bridges, and pipelines. In like manner, events which cause the need for such protective measures are earthquakes, winds, waves, traffic, lightning, and—today, regrettably—delib-erate acts. Indications are that control methods will be able to make a genuine contribution to this problem area, which is of great economic and social importance. In this paper, we review the rapid recent developments which have been occurring in the area of controlled civil structures, including full-scale imple-mentations, actuator types and characteristics, and trends to-ward the incorporation of more modern algorithms and technologies