Rapid advances have been made during the past few decades in earthquake response modification technologies for structures, most notably in base isolation and energy dissipation systems. Many practical applications of various dampers can be found worldwide and, in the United States, damper design has been included in building codes. The current design process is simple and useful for adding supplemental damping up to a reasonable level-but it is not as useful with higher levels of damping.

Taking a different approach, Structural Damping: Applications in Seismic...