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The UC San Diego Webshaker is a live earthquake experiment conducted over the Internet. A live video broadcast and precise measurements from sensors located on the test structure are sent to you over the Internet. You design the earthquake base motion by specifying the frequency, amplitude, and test duration.

1. Your command to shake is received by the web server at UCSD, which processes the command and then runs the shaker computer program accordingly.

2. This program constructs your control signal, which is routed to the power amplifier that drives the electro-magnetic shake table. The shake table delivers base motion to the test structure in the same way that an earthquake shakes buildings and other structures.

3. While the shaker and test structure are responding to the command signal, the server is also collecting data from sensors located on the structure by repeatedly converting the analog electrical signals from each sensor into discrete numbers.

4. Once the test is complete, the data is sent to your computer and presented in several x-y graphs, displaying the response from different parts of the structure. Currently we have a one-story aluminum structure with two LVDT's attached to the the structure, measuring the displacement of each floor of the structure during the experiment.



Please note that this site is under continuous construction and some elements of the site are under development and are currently unavailable.