• Geophysics and Geophysical Exploration
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• v.16 no.4
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• pp.234-239
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• 2013

The $M_W$ 9.0 thrust-fault earthquake has occurred in the Pacific coast of Tohoku, Japan, on March 11, 2011. We present the detection of the great earthquake and analyze T-waves associated with the main event and two other big aftershocks ($M_W$ > 7) recorded in a hydroacoustic array (H11N) in the Pacific Ocean by performing array and spectral analysis to examine characteristics of T-waves generated from the big events. The complex rupture process of the main event directly influences on the shape of the T-waves, and the peak locates on where T-waves excited from fast rupturing process arrive. We compare the two aftershocks with different fault type and show that the fault type and the source depth change shape and spectral contents of T-waves.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.8 no.4
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• pp.889-913
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• 2015

Structural vibration characteristics of a semi-active base-isolated building were investigated using seismic observation records including those of the 2011 Great East Japan earthquake (Tohoku earthquake). Three different types of analyses were conducted. First, we investigated the long-term changes in the natural frequencies and damping factors by using an ARX model and confirmed that the natural frequency of the superstructure decreased slightly after the main shock of the Tohoku earthquake. Second, we investigated short-term changes in the natural frequencies and damping factors during the main shock by using the N4SID method and observed different transition characteristics between the first and second modes. In the second mode, in which the superstructure response is most significant, the natural frequency changed depending on the response amplitude. In addition, at the beginning of the ground motion, the identified first natural frequency was high possibly as a result of sliding friction. Third, we compared the natural frequencies and damping factors between the conditions of a properly functional semi-active control system and a nonfunctional system, by using the records of the aftershocks of the Tohoku earthquake. However, we could not detect major differences because the response was probably influenced by sliding friction, which had a more significant effect on damping characteristics than did the semi-active dampers.

• Korean Journal of Remote Sensing
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• v.28 no.2
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• pp.255-266
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• 2012

The enormous disaster (Friday nightmare) occurred at 14:46 (JST) (05:46 UTC) on 11 March 2011, officially named "the 2011 Tohoku Earthquake and Tsunami". To monitor the variations of the marine environment after the earthquake, we used chlorophyll and Rrs(555) of GOCI and MODIS ocean color satellite data during March ~ May 2011. Before the earthquake, chlorophyll and Rrs(555) were relatively low around the Sendai areas. After the earthquake;their concentration and intensity were suddenly increased along the coast and the water column was disturbed by the tsunami wave. The severe distortions influenced by the tsunami occurred at less than 30 m water depth and the variations in offshore were difficult to discern the effect of the tsunami. The disturbance by the tsunami was still remained in the terrestrial environment after one month. However the ocean environment returned to the former condition in almost two month later.

• International Journal of High-Rise Buildings
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• v.5 no.3
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• pp.177-186
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• 2016

Along the subduction-zone of the western Japanese islands, large earthquakes are expected occur around the middle of this century, and long-period ground motions will reach major urban areas, shaking high-rise buildings violently. Since some old high-rise buildings were designed without considering long-period ground motions, reinforcing such buildings is an important issue. An effective method to reinforce existing high-rise buildings is installing additional dampers. However, a problem with ordinary dampers is that they require reinforcement of surrounding columns and girders to support large reaction forces generated during earthquake ground motion. To solve this problem, a deformation-dependent oil damper was developed. The most attractive feature of this damper is to reduce the damping force at the moment when the frame deformation comes close to its maximum value. Due to this feature, the reinforcement of columns, girders, and foundations are no longer required. The authors applied seismic retrofitting with a deformation-dependent oil damper to an existing 54-story office building (Shinjuku Center Building) located in Shinjuku ward, Tokyo, in 2009 to suppress vibration under the long period earthquake ground motions. The seismic responses were observed in the 2011 Tohoku Earthquake, and it is clarified that the damping ratio was higher and the response lower by 20% as compared to the building without dampers.

• Journal of the Korean earth science society
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• v.38 no.6
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• pp.427-441
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• 2017

Theory of Earth's free oscillation is revisited. Firstly, we summarized the underlying formulations, such as the equation of motion and its conversion into numerically integrable form and then explained computational procedures including the treatment of inner core-outer core boundary and core-mantle boundary, while the latter information has not been explicitly given in most publications. Secondly, we re-calculated the periods of Earth's free oscillation modes (period >200 s) for PREM model. In doing so we acquired the values of modes missing in Dziewonski and Anderson (1981). As a case observation, one seismogram after 2011 Tohoku earthquake recorded at Daejeon, Korea (KIGAM seismic station) was briefly analyzed to identify free oscillation mode excitations on its spectra. The material in this article will be most clear guide for those on calculating the Earth's free oscillation mode.

• Journal of Korean Society of Coastal and Ocean Engineers
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• v.28 no.5
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• pp.265-276
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• 2016

The 2011 Tohoku, Japan Tsunami, which occurred on March 11, 2011, reached the Korean Peninsula and was recorded at numerous tide stations. In the records of the north-eastern tide stations, tsunami forerunners were found in only about a few minutes after the earthquake, which was much earlier than the expected arrival time based on a numerical simulation. Murotani et al. (2015) found out that the bathymetry effect is related to the tsunami forerunners observed in Japan and Russia. In this study, the tsunami forerunners observed in Korea were well reproduced by a numerical simulation considering the bathymetry effect. This indicates that it is important to consider the bathymetry effect for a tsunami caused by an earthquake on shallowly dipping fault plane(e.g. 2011 Tohoku, Japan Earthquake). However, since the bathymetry effect requires additional computation time, it is necessary to examine the problems that results from applying the bathymetry effect to the tsunami warning system.

• International Journal of High-Rise Buildings
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• v.3 no.4
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• pp.255-271
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• 2014

A method of smart system identification of super high-rise buildings is proposed in which super high-rise buildings are modeled by a shear-bending system. The method is aimed at finding the story shear and bending stiffnesses of a specific story only from the horizontal floor accelerations. The proposed method uses a set of closed-form expressions for the story shear and bending stiffnesses in terms of the limited floor accelerations and utilizes a reduced shear-bending system with the same number of elements as the observation points. A difficulty of prediction of an unstable specific function in a low frequency range can be overcome by introducing an ARX model and discussing its relation with the Taylor series expansion coefficients of a transfer function. It is demonstrated that the shear-bending system can simulate the vibration records with a reasonable accuracy. It is also shown that the vibration records at two super high-rise buildings during the 2011 Tohoku (Japan) earthquake can be simulated with the proposed method including a technique of inserting degrees of freedom between the vibration recording points. Finally it is discussed further that the time-varying identification of fundamental natural period and stiffnesses can be conducted by setting an appropriate duration of evaluation in the batch least-squares method.

• 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.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.7 no.6
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• pp.1045-1060
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• 2014

The 2011 off the Pacific coast of Tohoku Earthquake brought serious damage around the Tohoku district in Japan, and much human life and fortune were lost. Bridges were damaged by this earthquake. It was the most serious damage that the superstructures of bridges were flowed out by tsunami. Earthquakes of the same scale are predicted in other areas of Japan. It is necessary to take measures for bridges near coast. In order to understand the tsunami force acting on the bridge, hydraulic model experiments was conducted. In addition, this paper focused on fairing that is effective in wind resistant stability. Installing fairing to bridges has been verified by experiments whether it is possible to reduce the force of tsunami.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Surveying, Geodesy, Photogrammetry and Cartography
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• v.38 no.6
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• pp.689-696
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• 2020

It is known through prior research that the crust of the Korean Peninsula moves southeast at an annual average of 3 cm/year. The 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake caused a great change in the crust of the Korean Peninsula. Since then, the frequency of earthquakes has increased on the Korean Peninsula. Therefore, by using NGII and IGS GNSS observation data of the recent 15 years, to analyze the trends of changes in the deformation of the Korean Peninsula before and after the outbreak of the Great East Japan Earthquake. Data processing utilized Bernese Software V5.2, a widely used scientific and technical software around the world. As a result, the global movement of the Korean peninsula differed by about 4mm and the direction of movement by about 10° compared to before the Great East Japan Earthquake. As for the internal distortion of the Korean Peninsula, the East-West expansion of the Korean peninsula's crust was observed during the Great East Japan Earthquake, but it is believed that it has not fully returned to the level before the Great East Japan Earthquake.