Authored by the most active scholars in their respective areas, this volume covers the most recent developments, both theoretical and applicative, in multi-disciplinary reliability evaluation areas, many of which are cutting-edge and not discussed elsewhere in book form. The broad coverage includes the latest thoughts on design for low probability and high consequence events like the failure of the World Trade Center as well as risk acceptability based on the Life Quality Index. Other chapters discuss the development of the performance-based design concept, and the generally overlooked area of the reliability evaluation of bridges and offshore structures. Since the finite element method is routinely used for structural analyses, emphasis is put on discussing reliability evaluation using finite elements including consideration of the mesh-free finite element method. Corrosion and fatigue reliability evaluation techniques are other urgent issues that are dealt with in depth. Risk-based

# Risk and Risk Perception for Low Probability, High Consequence Events in the Built Environment (R Corotis) # Risk Acceptability Based on the Life Quality Index (R Rackwitz) # Performance Evaluation of Infrastructures (M Chowdhury) # Reliability-Based Performance Design (Y K Wen) # Reliability-Based Calibration of Design Codes (A Nowak) # Reliability of Bridges (M Ghosn) # Stochastic Response of Fixed Offshore Structures (Q S Tong) # Dynamic Reliability Evaluation Using Finite Elements -- Steel Structures (J Huh & A Haldar) # Mesh-Free Finite Element Methods for Probabilistic Analysis (S Rahman) # Application of Reliability Methods for Fatigue Analysis and Design (P Wirsching) # Probabilistic Models for Corrosion in Structural Reliability Assessment (R Melchers) # Structural Health Assessment (H Katkhuda et al.) # Reliability Analysis Using Information from Experts (J Mohammadi & S DeSantiago) # The Renewal Model in Reliability-Based Optimization (R Rackwitz)