The BAPS Hindu Mandir, recently constructed in Abu Dhabi, UAE, is a complex unreinforced stone masonry structure built from thousands of sculpted sandstone and marble pieces employing ancient Indian techniques called Shilp Shastra. The entire structure is substantially large with a footprint size of 5,100 m2 and unique so that it is not covered by modern seismic design standards. Its performance was verified by conducting dynamic field tests presented herein. The most vulnerable substructure was identified based on both engineering judgement and modal analysis of the entire structure employing a detailed 3D finite element model, which was validated via the field experiments. A “local” model was developed for the identified vulnerable substructure which significantly reduced model complexity and allowed to overcome computational limitations. Based on the response of the local model, the relative importance of the sensor locations was determined via a Displacement Index method in addition to a reduction of the total variance of spectral accelerations using conditional probability theory. Through this approach, a methodology for selecting the optimal sensor placement with application on the complex unreinforced stone masonry Hindu Mandir is proposed.

Bismuth ferrite has garnered considerable attention as a promising candidate for magnetoelectric spin-orbit coupled logic-in-memory. As model systems, epitaxial BiFeO₃ thin films have typically been deposited at relatively high temperatures (650-800 °C), higher than allowed for direct integration with silicon-CMOS platforms. Here, we circumvent this problem by growing lanthanum-substituted BiFeO₃ at 450 °C (which is reasonably compatible with silicon-CMOS integration) on epitaxial BaPb_0.75Bi_0.25O₃ electrodes. Notwithstanding the large lattice mismatch between the La-BiFeO₃, BaPb_0.75Bi_0.25O₃, and SrTiO₃ (001) substrates, all the layers in the heterostructures are well ordered with a [001] texture. Polarization mapping using atomic resolution STEM imaging and vector mapping established the short-range polarization ordering in the low temperature grown La-BiFeO₃. Current-voltage, pulsed-switching, fatigue, and retention measurements follow the characteristic behavior of high-temperature grown La-BiFeO₃, where SrRuO₃ typically serves as the metallic electrode. These results provide a possible route for realizing epitaxial multiferroics on complex-oxide buffer layers at low temperatures and opens the door for potential silicon-CMOS integration.

Antiferromagnets have attracted significant attention in the field of magnonics, as promising candidates for ultralow-energy carriers for information transfer for future computing. The role of crystalline orientation distribution on magnon transport has received very little attention. In multiferroics such as BiFeO₃ the coupling between antiferromagnetic and polar order imposes yet another boundary condition on spin transport. Thus, understanding the fundamentals of spin transport in such systems requires a single domain, a single crystal. We show that through Lanthanum (La) substitution, a single ferroelectric domain can be engineered with a stable, single-variant spin cycloid, controllable by an electric field. The spin transport in such a single domain displays a strong anisotropy, arising from the underlying spin cycloid lattice. Our work shows a pathway to understanding the fundamental origins of magnon transport in such a single domain multiferroic.