• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.77 no.4
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• pp.495-508
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• 2021

This study devises a novel approach, namely quadruple 1D convolutional neural network, for detecting connection stiffness reduction in steel truss bridge structure using experimental and numerical modal data. The method is developed based on expertise in two domains: firstly, in Structural Health Monitoring, the mode shapes and its high-order derivatives, including second, third, and fourth derivatives, are accurate indicators in assessing damages. Secondly, in the Machine Learning literature, the deep convolutional neural networks are able to extract relevant features from input data, then perform classification tasks with high accuracy and reduced time complexity. The efficacy and effectiveness of the present method are supported through an extensive case study with the railway Nam O bridge. It delivers highly accurate results in assessing damage localization and damage severity for single as well as multiple damage scenarios. In addition, the robustness of this method is tested with the presence of white noise reflecting unavoidable uncertainties in signal processing and modeling in reality. The proposed approach is able to provide stable results with data corrupted by noise up to 10%.

• Advances in concrete construction
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• v.13 no.1
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• pp.11-23
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• 2022

Conventional concrete needs some improvement in the mechanical properties, which can be obtained by different admixtures. However, making concrete samples costume always time and money. In this paper, different types of hybrid algorithms are applied to develop predictive models for forecasting compressive strength (CS) of concretes containing metakaolin (MK) and fly ash (FA). In this regard, three different algorithms have been used, namely multilayer perceptron (MLP), radial basis function (RBF), and support vector machine (SVR), to predict CS of concretes by considering most influencers input variables. These algorithms integrated with the grey wolf optimization (GWO) algorithm to increase the model's accuracy in predicting (GWMLP, GWRBF, and GWSVR). The proposed MLP models were implemented and evaluated in three different layers, wherein each layer, GWO, fitted the best neuron number of the hidden layer. Correspondingly, the key parameters of the SVR model are identified using the GWO method. Also, the optimization algorithm determines the hidden neurons' number and the spread value to set the RBF structure. The results show that the developed models all provide accurate predictions of the CS of concrete incorporating MK and FA with R² larger than 0.9972 and 0.9976 in the learning and testing stage, respectively. Regarding GWMLP models, the GWMLP1 model outperforms other GWMLP networks. All in all, GWSVR has the worst performance with the lowest indices, while the highest score belongs to GWRBF.

• Advances in nano research
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• v.12 no.4
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• pp.387-403
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• 2022

Silica nanoparticles, which have a broad range of sizes and specific surface features, have been used in many industrial applications. This study was conducted to synthesize monodispersed silica nanoparticles directly from tetraethyl orthosilicate (TEOS) with an alkaline catalyst (NH₃) based on the sol-gel process and the Stöber method. A central composite design (CCD) is used to build a second-order (quadratic) model for the response variables without requiring a complete three-level factorial experiment. The process was then optimized to achieve the minimum particle size with the lowest concentration of TEOS. Dynamic light scattering and scanning electron microscopy were used to analyze the size, dispersity, and morphology of the synthesized nanoparticles. After optimization, a confirmation test was carried out to evaluate the confidence level of the software prediction. The results revealed that the predicted optimization is consistent with experimental procedures, and the model is significant at the 95% confidence level.

• Geomechanics and Engineering
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• v.30 no.2
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• pp.107-121
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• 2022

Coal pillar assessment is of broad importance to underground engineering structure, as the pillar failure can lead to enormous disasters. Because of the highly non-linear correlation between the pillar failure and its influential attributes, conventional forecasting techniques cannot generate accurate outcomes. To approximate the complex behavior of coal pillar, this paper elucidates a new idea to forecast the underground coal pillar stability using combined unsupervised-supervised learning. In order to build a database of the study, a total of 90 patterns of pillar cases were collected from authentic engineering structures. A state-of-the art feature depletion method, t-distribution symmetric neighbor embedding (t-SNE) has been employed to reduce significance of actual data features. Consequently, an unsupervised machine learning technique K-mean clustering was followed to reassign the t-SNE dimensionality reduced data in order to compute the relative class of coal pillar cases. Following that, the reassign dataset was divided into two parts: 70 percent for training dataset and 30 percent for testing dataset, respectively. The accuracy of the predicted data was then examined using support vector classifier (SVC) model performance measures such as precision, recall, and f₁-score. As a result, the proposed model can be employed for properly predicting the pillar failure class in a variety of underground rock engineering projects.

• Steel and Composite Structures
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• v.43 no.4
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• pp.501-509
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• 2022

Cracks are common defects in concrete structures. Thus far, crack inspection has been manually performed using the contact inspection method. This manpower-dependent method inevitably increases the cost and work hours. Various non-contact studies have been conducted to overcome such difficulties. However, previous studies have focused on developing a methodology for non-contact inspection or local quantitative detection of crack width or length on concrete surfaces. However, crack depth can affect the safety of concrete structures. In particular, although macrocrack depth is structurally fatal, it is difficult to find it with the existing method. Therefore, an experimental investigation based on non-contact infrared thermography and multivariate machine learning was performed in this study to estimate the hidden macrocrack depth. To consider practical applications for inspection, an experiment was conducted that considered the simulated piloting of an unmanned aerial vehicle equipped with infrared thermography equipment. The crack depths (10-60 mm) were comparatively evaluated using linear regression, gradient boosting, and random forest (AI regression methods).

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.83 no.4
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• pp.537-549
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• 2022

In this paper, a novel multi-feature model predictive control (MPC) framework with real-time and adaptive performances is proposed for intelligent structural control in which some drawbacks of the algorithm including, complex control rule and non-optimality, are alleviated. Hence, Linear Programming (LP) is utilized to simplify the resulted control rule. Afterward, the Whale Optimization Algorithm (WOA) is applied to the optimal and adaptive tuning of the LP weights independently at each time step. The stochastic control rule is also achieved using Kalman Filter (KF) to handle noisy measurements. The Extreme Learning Machine (ELM) is then adopted to develop a data-driven and real-time control algorithm. The efficiency of the developed algorithm is then demonstrated by numerical simulation of a twenty-story high-rise benchmark building subjected to earthquake excitations. The competency of the proposed method is proven from the aspects of optimality, stochasticity, and adaptivity compared to the KF-based MPC (KMPC) and constrained MPC (CMPC) algorithms in vibration suppression of building structures. The average value for performance indices in the near-field and far-field (El earthquakes demonstrates a reduction up to 38.3% and 32.5% compared with KMPC and CMPC, respectively.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.84 no.1
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• pp.101-111
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• 2022

It is widely known that axially loaded fiber-reinforced polymer (FRP) confined concrete presents significant and enhanced mechanical properties with reference to the unconfined concrete. Therefore, to predict the mechanical behavior of FRP-confined concrete two quantities-peak strength and ultimate strain are required. Despite the significant advances, the determination of the ultimate strain of FRP-confined concrete is one of the most challenging problems to be resolved. This is often attributed to our persistence in desiring the conventional methods as the sole technique to examine this phenomenon and the complex nature of the ultimate strain of FRP-confined concrete. To bridge the research gap, this study adopted two machine learning (ML) techniques-artificial neural network (ANN) and Gaussian process regression (GPR)-to analyze observations obtained from 627 datasets of FRP-confined concrete circular and non-circular sections under axial loading test. Besides, the techniques are also used to predict the ultimate strain of FRP-confined concrete. Seven parameters namely width/diameter of the specimens, corner radius ratio, the strength of concrete, FRP elastic modulus, FRP thickness, FRP tensile rupture strain, and the axial strain of unconfined concrete-are the input parameters used to predict the ultimate strain of FRP-confined concrete. The results of the current study highlight the merit of using AI techniques in structural engineering applications given their extraordinary ability to comprehend multidimensional phenomena of FRP-confined concrete structures with ease, low computational cost, and high performance over the existing empirical models.

• Computers and Concrete
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• v.28 no.6
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• pp.567-583
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• 2021

The use of waste materials as a binder or aggregate in the concrete mixture is a great step towards sustainability in the construction industry. Waste rubber (WR) can be used as coarse and fine aggregates in concrete and improves the crack resistance, impact resistance, and fatigue life of the produced concrete. However, the mechanical properties of rubberized concrete degrade significantly by replacing the natural aggregate with WR. To have accurate estimations of the mechanical properties of rubberized concrete, two machine learning methods consisting of artificial neural network (ANN) and neuro-fuzzy system (NFS) were served in this study. To do this, a comprehensive dataset was collected from reliable literature, and two scenarios were addressed for the selection of input variables. In the first scenario, the critical ratios of the rubberized concrete and the concrete age were considered as the input variables. In contrast, the mechanical properties of concrete without WR and the percentage of aggregate volume replaced by WR were assumed as the input variables in the second scenario. The results show that the first scenario models outperform the models proposed by the second scenario. Moreover, the developed ANN models are more reliable than the proposed NFS models in most cases.

• Advances in nano research
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• v.14 no.1
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• pp.17-25
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• 2023

Gold nanoparticles have recognized a promising drug carriers in many diseases. These nanoparticles could carry anti-inflammatory drugs in the case of muscle injury and for fatigue relief. On the other hand, specific surface of this kind of nanoparticles could be critical in amount of drug they could carry. Therefore, in this study, we explore different methodology and influencing parameters on the specific surface of gold nanoparticles. After specifying the main parameters, different machine learning and artificial neural network are adopted to model the effects of different parameters. Furthermore, response surface methodology is utilized to obtain a quadrilateral relationship between different parameters and specific surface. The results indicate that concentration of the gold salt solution is the most important parameter in increasing the size of gold nanoparticle and, as a consequence, increasing specific surface. Moreover, the ability of gold nanoparticles in prolonging retention of the drugs is discussed in detail.

• Geomechanics and Engineering
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• v.34 no.1
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• pp.43-49
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• 2023

Knowledge of minimum horizontal stress (S_hmin) is a significant step in determining full stress tensor. It provides crucial information for the production of sand, hydraulic fracturing, determination of safe mud weight window, reservoir production behavior, and wellbore stability. Calculating the S_hmin using indirect methods has been proved to be awkward because a lot of data are required in all of these models. Also, direct techniques such as hydraulic fracturing are costly and time-consuming. To figure these problems out, this work aims to apply the long-short-term memory (LSTM) algorithm to S_hmin time-series prediction. 13956 datasets obtained from an oil well logging operation were applied in the models. 80% of the data were used for training, and 20% of the data were used for testing. In order to achieve the maximum accuracy of the LSTM model, its hyper-parameters were optimized significantly. Through different statistical indices, the LSTM model's performance was compared with with other machine learning methods. Finally, the optimized LSTM model was recommended for S_hmin prediction in the well logging operation.