• International Journal of High-Rise Buildings
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• v.5 no.3
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• pp.155-165
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• 2016

A much higher level of seismic performance is needed for supertall buildings due to increased demands for their functional continuities and the recognized needs for their continuing emergence in metropolitan areas. This paper analyzes, compares, and contrasts responses recorded during the 2011 Tohoku-oki Earthquake of different supertall buildings featuring conventional and vibration-controlled engineering systems. The superior performance and advantage of the latter are pointed out, and the typical dynamic properties, response characteristics, and effects on the secondary system are discussed. Ongoing efforts to enhance vibration control performance are described, covering the development of specifications, use of performance curves and targeted displacement design, and methods to find appropriate locations of damper installation resulting in a minimized amount of dampers.