Vine‐Copula Seismic Functionality Evaluation Method of Medical Room Systems Based on Shaking Table Tests

ABSTRACT A room, as a critical unit of a building, plays a key role in fulfilling functional demands, which relies on the coordinated performance of essential equipment and facilities. Understanding the seismic damage mechanisms and correlations among room components is crucial for assessing the post‐earthquake functionality of the rooms and the entire building. In this study, shaking table tests on a full‐scale medical room model were conducted to investigate these issues. The results revealed the damage correlations of medical equipment within the same room and that the damage patterns were influenced by room layouts and equipment spacing. Based on these findings, a functionality evaluation method for room systems was developed by using mutual information and vine copulas to account for the component correlations. Incorporating the experimental results, the model demonstrated its ability to describe the damage correlations among components. Moreover, the seismic fragility curves of the room system were provided by the proposed model. The proposed vine‐copula‐based method offers a novel tool for linking individual component fragility to the seismic functionality evaluation of building systems, enabling rapid evaluations of building and room system seismic functionality that consider damage correlations among components.