A. Ghobarah - Professor, and Joe NG/JNE Consulting Chair, Department of Civil Engineering McMaster University, Hamilton, Canada,

Experimental research has been credited by discovering new phenomena, explaining complex behaviour and by providing reliable calibration and verification of analytical models. Structural testing is tedious, time consuming and expensive. However, there have been several significant new developments in experimental techniques and in the use of innovative instrumentations,equipment and test setups. Earthquake and dynamic testing of prototype components and structures are entering a new era of complex but more realistic representation of structural behaviour. New state-of-the-art experimental facilities have been built and some are still under construction, which will revolutionize the experimental research in the behaviour of structural systems including the interactions between soil, foundation and structure.The objective of this article is to review approaches for experimental study of structural systems.New test setups and equipment systems that will influence the direction of experimental study of structural systems for the next 10 to 15 years are discussed.