As cities become more populated and skyscrapers become taller, building safer, more resilient high-rise buildings becomes even more critical and complex. FIU’s Amal Elawady and researchers at Lehigh University partnered to use a part-physical, part-computational testing method to understand how powerful winds affect tall buildings.

At 260 actions per second, the physical and digital buildings adjust to one another’s movements to remain in sync, creating a realistic simulation. This method, known as real-time cyber-physical modeling, links a building model at FIU’s Wall of Wind with a model on a computer to create realistic simulations of how skyscrapers face powerful winds.

• AMAL ELAWADY