The 1st International Project Competition for Structural Health Monitoring (IPC-SHM, 2020): A summary and benchmark problem

To promote the development of structural health monitoring around the world, the 1st International Project Competition for Structural Health Monitoring (IPC-SHM, 2020) was initiated and organized in 2020 by the Asia-Pacific Network of Centers for Research in Smart Structures Technology, Harbin Institute of Technology, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and four leading companies in the application of structural health monitoring technology. The goal of this competition was to attract more young scholars to engage in the study of structural health monitoring, encouraging them to provide creative and effective solutions for full-scale applications. Recognizing the recent advent and importance of artificial intelligence in structural health monitoring, three competition projects were set up with the data from full-scale bridges: (1) image-based identification of fatigue cracks in bridge girders, (2) data anomaly detection for structural health monitoring, and (3) condition assessment of stay cables using cable tension data. Three corresponding data sets were released at http://www.schm.org.cn and http://sstl.cee.illinois.edu/ipc-shm2020. Participants were required to be full-time undergraduate students, M.S. students, Ph.D. students, or young scholars within 3 years after obtaining their Ph.D. Both individual and teams (each team had no more than five individuals) could compete. Submissions for the competition included a 10- to 15-page technical paper, a 10-min presentation video with PowerPoint slides, and commented code. The organizing committee then conducted the validation, review, and evaluation. A total of 330 participants in 112 teams from 70 universities and institutions in 12 countries registered for the competition, resulting in 75 papers from 56 teams from 57 different affiliations finally being submitted. Of those submitted, 31, 30, and 14 papers were for Projects 1, 2, and 3, respectively. After completion of the review by the organization committee and awards committee, the top 10, 10, and 5 teams were selected as the prize winners for the three competition projects.