Case Study: Politecnico di Milano University achieves rapid seismic retrofit design and optimization with Altair's Inspire

Politecnico di Milano University - Customer Case Study

Politecnico di Milano University’s ACTLAB tackled the challenge of designing seismic retrofits for unreinforced masonry buildings to preserve historic structures. The team and student Davide Gamberini turned to Altair’s solidThinking Inspire as a computational design and topology-optimization tool to quickly test structural concepts and materials for improved earthquake performance.

Using Inspire (from Altair), Davide simulated three seismic scenarios with three materials (UHPC, steel, CFRP), identified two recurring optimal form types, and evaluated displacement and shear to pick the best solutions; he narrowed nine concepts to three in just a few days. Altair’s tools simplified and sped the design process, empowered a student without advanced structural-engineering training, and set the project up for further validation with Altair’s OptiStruct.

Politecnico di Milano University

Ingrid Paoletti

Professor