• Francesco Clementi, Università Politecnica delle Marche
• Antonio Formisano, Università di Napoli Federico II, Napoli, Italy
• Gabriele Milani, Politecnico di Milano, Milano, Italy

The Architectural Heritage (AH), which includes iconic buildings like churches, historical palaces, towers, monuments, as well as historical bridges, wall, small villages, etc., is a pillar of the societal identity and among the most strategic world economic assets, making its preservation a commitment towards future generations. The effects of extreme actions, e.g. earthquake, flood, typhons, tsunami, etc., are such as to produce considerable damage, especially in the AH, with catastrophic loss of income from cultural tourism in some areas, with both social and economic inconveniences for local communities. Moreover, the loss of the AH can lead to the dispersion of collective memory and identity, and the accessibility to AH usually leads to a significant improvement of the economics, enhancing social uniqueness. For these reasons, ensuring historical buildings to be safe and functional, along with infrastructures, will certainly enhance their usability and therefore the livability of cities.

Conservation and preservation of AH in high-risk areas are still today scientific research challenges. Within this context, the understanding and prediction of the structural response of heritage constructions subjected to dynamic loads play a fundamental role. At the same time, this aspect represents a crucial task due to the complexity of the constituent materials, mostly characterized by masonry. Masonry is a heterogeneous material which behaviour depends on several features: mechanical characteristics of matrix and inclusions, interface properties, in-plane texture, out-of-plane composition, etc. In this perspective, during the last decades the scientific community has developed different approaches, to achieve a consistent description of historical masonry constructions.

The aim of this mini-symposium is to discuss the new advances in modelling of masonry material with specific applications to historical masonry monuments. Topics to be covered, but not limited to, are:
• Advanced numerical models
• Seismic assessment of historical constructions
• New strategies for the preservation of heritage structures (SHM, damage detection,...)
• Nonlinear static and dynamic analysis
• Incremental Dynamic Analysis applied to historical structures
• Constitutive models for masonry materials
• Homogenization techniques
• Multi-scale analysis
• Large-scale seismic vulnerability analysis
• Repairing and retrofitting interventions
• Novel restoration techniques
• Integrated seismic-energy consolidation systems