Improving stability and resilience of building structure with steel-timber composite columns: A case study and simulation analysis

Research on green buildings is receiving increasing attention in areas such as mitigating global climate change and promoting sustainability in the built environment. This study is based on the experimental and simulation analysis of embedded composite beam-column elements to investigate their potential in improving the sustainability, structural stability and seismic capacity of lightweight residential buildings. A case study of Tianyuan II villa in Changsha city district, China, is used to demonstrate the proposed methodology and validate the rationality of the design solution. In this case, the conventional hollow steel tube columns were replaced by a novel embedded composite column design derived from an optimized steel-to-wood ratio. This alternative approach aims to improve the load carrying capacity and buckling resistance of the building elements, as well as the overall structural integrity of the building frame, especially under seismic conditions. The study shows that: the overall dimensional stability of the building with this structural column under seismic action is better, the hysteresis curve of the column is full, which reflects a strong seismic wave absorption capacity; the damage is mainly manifested by the fracture of the column foot joints and the tearing caused by the non-uniform contact; and the structural column is able to replace the pure steel columns and to ensure the safety and stability of the building.