• Journal of the Korean Society of Safety
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• v.33 no.4
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• pp.46-53
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• 2018

This study examined the maximum resistant moment and nonlinear rotational stiffness of wedge joint between the vertical and horizontal members of system supports. To examine the maximum resistant moment and propose the nonlinear rotation stiffness of wedge joint, 6 specimens were tested and additional 3 specimens, where the horizontal member was welded to the vertical member, were tested to compare the moment capacity of wedge joints. The average maximum moment in the tested wedge joint was 1.183 kNm which represented about 70 % of the maximum moment developed in the welded specimens. And, as simulating nonlinear rotational stiffness of the wedge joint, a tri-linear model was suggested. The rotational stiffness was estimated as 23.095 kNm/rad in first stage, 7.945 kNm/rad in second stage, and 3.073 kNm/rad in third stage. For the failure mode, the specimen with the wedge joint showed the failure of joint between vertical and horizontal members. However, the specimen with welded joint represented the yielding of horizontal members.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.9 no.4
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• pp.875-891
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• 2015

Earthquake can occur anywhere in the world and it is essential to design important members in special structures based on maximum possible forces that can be produced in them under severe earthquake. In addition, since the earthquake is an accidental phenomena and there are no similar earthquakes, therefore the possibility of strong earthquakes should be taken into account in earthquake-resistant design of important structures. Based on this viewpoint, finding the critical acceleration which maximizes internal forces is an essential factor in structural design. This paper proposes critical excitation method to compute the critical acceleration in design of important members in special structures. These critical accelerations are computed so that the columns' internal shear force at the base of the structure at each time step is maximized under constraints on ground motion. Among computed critical accelerations (of each time step), the one which produces maximum internal shear force is selected. A numerical example presents to show the efficiency of critical excitation method in determining the maximum internal shear force and base moment under variety of constraints. The results show that these method can be used to compute the resonant earthquake which have large enough effective duration of earthquake strong motion (between 12.86 sec to 13.38 sec) and produce the internal shear force and base moment for specific column greater than the same value for selected earthquakes in constructing the critical excitation (for different cases about 2.78 to 1.29 times the San Fernando earthquake). Therefore, a group of them can be utilized in developing the response spectrum for design of special structures.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.20 no.1
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• pp.169-178
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• 2010

The microbial community structure in Thailand soils contaminated with low and high levels of arsenic was determined by denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis. Band pattern analysis indicated that the bacterial community was not significantly different in the two soils. Phylogenetic analysis obtained by excising and sequencing six bands indicated that the soils were dominated by Arthrobacter koreensis and $\beta$-Proteobacteria. Two hundred and sixty-two bacterial isolates were obtained from arsenic-contaminated soils. The majority of the As-resistant isolates were Gramnegative bacteria. MIC studies indicated that all of the tested bacteria had greater resistance to arsenate than arsenite. Some strains were capable of growing in medium containing up to 1,500 mg/l arsenite and arsenate. Correlations analysis of resistance patterns of arsenite resistance indicated that the isolated bacteria could be categorized into 13 groups, with a maximum similarity value of 100%. All strains were also evaluated for resistance to eight antibiotics. The antibiotic resistance patterns divided the strains into 100 unique groups, indicating that the strains were very diverse. Isolates from each antibiotic resistance group were characterized in more detail by using the repetitive extragenic palindromic-PCR (rep-PCR) DNA fingerprinting technique with ERIC primers. The PCR products were analyzed by agarose gel electrophoresis. The genetic relatedness of 100 bacterial fingerprints, determined by using the Pearson product-moment similarity coefficient, showed that the isolates could be divided into four clusters, with similarity values ranging from 5-99%. Although many isolates were genetically diverse, others were clonal in nature. Additionally, the arsenic-resistant isolates were examined for the presence of arsenic resistance (ars) genes by using PCR, and 30% of the isolates were found to carry an arsenate reductase encoded by the arsC gene.

• Journal of Korean Society of Steel Construction
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• v.17 no.5 s.78
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• pp.569-580
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• 2005

The postbeam joint connection of the existing steel structure moment flexible frame system did not produce sufficient seismic resistance during the earthquakes in Northridge and Kobe, and it sustained brittle fracturing on the joint connection. This study was performed to execute the high-tensile bolt share connection of H-beams web and the full-scale experiment as a parameter of the existing reinforcement of H-flange rib, by making the shape of the existing joint connection. This experiment was performed to determine the extent of the decrease of the number of high-tensile bolts and how to improve workability of the two-phase shear connection of web beam. In addition, this study was performed to enhance the seismic resistant capacity through the enforcement of rib plates. As a result of the experiment of two-phase shear connection of H-beam web and of joint connection to be reinforced by rib plates, the results of this study showed that the initial stiffness, energy-dissipation capacity, and rotational capacity of plasticity was higher than the existing joint connection. As to the rate of increasing the strength and deformation capacity, there were differences between the tension side and compression side because of the position of shear tap. However, as a whole, they have shown excellent seismic resistant capacity. Also, all the test subjects exceeded 4% (rate of delamination), about 0.029 rad (total plastic capacity), and about 130% (maximum strength of joint connection) of fully plastic moment for the original section. Accordingly, this study was considered as it would be available in the design more than the intermediate-level of moment flexible frame.

• Steel and Composite Structures
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• v.20 no.5
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• pp.1155-1171
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• 2016

Post-tensioned (PT) steel moment resisting frames (MRFs) with semi-rigid connections (SRC) can be used to control the hysteretic energy demands and to reduce the maximum inter-story drift (${\gamma}$). In this study the seismic behavior of steel MRFs with PT connections is estimated by incremental nonlinear dynamic analysis in terms of dissipated hysteretic energy ($E_H$) demands. For this aim, five PT steel MRFs are subjected to 30 long duration earthquake ground motions recorded on soft soil sites. To assess the energy dissipated in the frames with PT connections, a new expression is proposed for the hysteretic behavior of semi-rigid connections validated by experimental tests. The performance was estimated not only for the global $E_H$ demands in the steel frames; but also for, the distribution and demands of hysteretic energy in beams, columns and connections considering several levels of deformation. The results show that $E_H$ varies with ${\gamma}$, and that most of $E_H$ is dissipated by the connections. It is observed in all the cases a log-normal distribution of $E_H$ through the building height. The largest demand of $E_H$ occurs between 0.25 and 0.5 of the height. Finally, an equation is proposed to calculate the distribution of $E_H$ in terms of the normalized height of the stories (h/H) and the inter-story drift.

• Coupled systems mechanics
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• v.12 no.4
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• pp.315-335
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• 2023

The building sector has seen a huge increase in the use of lightweight concrete recently, which might result in saving in both cost and time. As a result, the study has been done on various types of concrete, including lightweight (LC), heavyweight (HC), and ordinary concrete (OC), to understand how they react to earthquake loads. The comparisons between their responses have also been taken into account in order to acquire the optimal reaction for various materials in building work. The findings demonstrate that LWC building models are more earthquake-resistant than the other varieties due to the reduction in building weight which can be a curial factor in the resistance of earthquake forces. Another crucial factor that was taken into study is the combination of various types of concrete [HC, LC, and OC] in the structural components. On the other hand, the bending moments and shear forces of LC had reduced to 17% and 19%, respectively, when compared to OC. Otherwise, the bending moment and shear force demand responses in the HC model reach their maximum values by more than 34% compared to the reference model OC. In addition, the results show that the LCC-OCR (light concrete column and ordinary concrete roof) and OCC-LCR (ordinary concrete for the column and light concrete for the roof) models' responses have fewer values than the other types.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.14 no.1
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• pp.1-10
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• 2018

Seismic retrofitting of existing buildings and design of earth-quake resistant buildings are important issues associated with earthquake-prone zones. Use of metallic-yielding dampers as an energy dissipation system is an acceptable method for controlling damages in structures and improving their seismic performance. In this study, the optimal distribution of dampers for reducing the seismic response of steel frames with multi-degrees freedom is presented utilizing the uniform distribution of deformations. This has been done in a way that, the final configuration of dampers in the frames lead to minimum weight while satisfying the performance criteria. It is shown that such a structure has an optimum seismic performance, in which the maximum structure capacity is used. Then the genetic algorithm which is an evolutionary optimization method is used for optimal arrangement of the steel dampers in the structure. In continuation for specifying the optimal accurate response, the local search algorithm based on the gradient concept has been selected. In this research the introduced optimization methods are used for optimal retrofitting in the moment-resisting frame with inelastic behavior and initial weakness in design. Ultimately the optimal configuration of dampers over the height of building specified and by comparing the results of the uniform deformation method with those of the genetic algorithm, the validity of the uniform deformation method in terms of accuracy, Time Speed Optimization and the simplicity of the theory have been proven.

• Computers and Concrete
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• v.3 no.1
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• pp.1-15
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• 2006

The seismic safety of reinforced concrete containment building can be evaluated by probabilistic analysis considering randomness of earthquake, which is more rational than deterministic analysis. In the safety assessment of earthquake-resistant structures by the deterministic theory, it is not easy to consider the effects of random variables but the reliability theory and random vibration theory are useful to assess the seismic safety with considering random effects. The reliability assessment of reinforced concrete containment building subjected to earthquake load includes the structural analysis considering random variables such as load, resistance and analysis method, the definition of limit states and the reliability analysis. The reliability analysis procedure requires much time and labor and also needs to get the high confidence in results. In this study, random vibration analysis of containment building is performed with random variables as earthquake load, concrete compressive strength, modal damping ratio. The seismic responses of critical elements of structure are approximated at the most probable failure point by the response surface method. The response surface method helps to figure out the quantitative characteristics of structural response variability. And the limit state is defined as the failure surface of concrete under multi-axial stress, finally the limit state probability of failure can be obtained simply by first-order second moment method. The reliability analysis for the multiaxial strength limit state and the uniaxial strength limit state is performed and the results are compared with each other. This study concludes that the multiaxial failure criterion is a likely limit state to predict concrete failure strength under combined state of stresses and the reliability analysis results are compatible with the fact that the maximum compressive strength of concrete under biaxial compression state increases.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.78 no.3
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• pp.351-368
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• 2021

This paper, by applying a reliability-based framework, develops seismic vulnerability macrozonation maps for Tehran, the capital and one of the most earthquake-vulnerable city of Iran. Seismic performance assessment of 3-, 4- and 5-story steel moment resisting frames (SMRFs), designed according to ASCE/SEI 41-17 and Iranian Code of Practice for Seismic Resistant Design of Buildings (2800 Standard), is investigated in terms of overall maximum inter-story drift ratio (MIDR) and unit repair cost ratio which is hereafter known as "damage ratio". To this end, Tehran city is first meshed into a network of 66 points to numerically locate low- to mid-rise SMRFs. Active faults around Tehran are next modeled explicitly. Two different combination of faults, based on available seismological data, are then developed to explore the impact of choosing a proper seismic scenario. In addition, soil effect is exclusively addressed. After building analytical models, reliability methods in combination with structure-specific probabilistic models are applied to predict demand and damage ratio of structures in a cost-effective paradigm. Due to capability of proposed methodology incorporating both aleatory and epistemic uncertainties explicitly, this framework which is centered on the regional demand and damage ratio estimation via structure-specific characteristics can efficiently pave the way for decision makers to find the most vulnerable area in a regional scale. This technical basis can also be adapted to any other structures which the demand and/or damage ratio prediction models are developed.