• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.22 no.6
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• pp.549-559
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• 2022

The quasi-static finite element (FE) approaches are widely used for the seismic analysis of tunnels. However, the conventional quasi-static approaches may cause significant deviations when the tunnel excavation process is simulated prior to the quasi-static analysis. In addition, they cannot account for vertical excitations. Therefore, this paper first highlights the limitations of conventional approaches. A hybrid quasi-static FE approach is subsequently proposed and extensively validated for various conditions. The hybrid approach is simple and not time consuming, and it can be used for the preliminary seismic design of tunnels, especially when the tunnel excavation and vertically propagating P-waves are considered.

• Geomechanics and Engineering
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• v.13 no.2
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• pp.301-318
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• 2017

Based on the existing research results, a three-dimensional failure mechanism of tunnel face was constructed. The dynamic seismic effect was taken into account on the basis of quasi-static method, and the nonlinear Mohr-Coulomb failure criterion was introduced into the limit analysis by using the tangent technique. The collapse pressure along with the failure scope of tunnel face was obtained through nonlinear limit analysis. Results show that nonlinear coefficient and initial cohesion have a significant impact on the collapse pressure and failure zone. However, horizontal seismic coefficient and vertical seismic proportional coefficient merely affect the collapse pressure and the location of failure surface. And their influences on the volume and height of failure mechanism are not obvious. By virtue of reliability theory, the influences of horizontal and vertical seismic forces on supporting pressure were discussed. Meanwhile, safety factors and supporting pressures with respect to 3 different safety levels are also obtained, which may provide references to seismic design of tunnels.

• Journal of Korean Tunnelling and Underground Space Association
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• v.18 no.3
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• pp.319-329
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• 2016

Underground structures such as subsea tunnel having large section should be stable against seismic loads. In general, underground structures show more stable behavior due to the limited dynamic motion and force, and considerable energy dissipation; however, severe damage was reported from recent earthquakes. Therefore, more sophisticated and analytic approach is required to investigate the seismic response of underground structure like subsea tunnel. In this study, seismic analysis of virtual Honam-Jeju subsea tunnel are performed. Consequently, stresses and forces of tunnel lining increased at fractured and/or weak rock zones. Stresses and forces of tunnel lining also increased at large section under axially deformed condition; however, decrease under transversely deformed condition.

• Geomechanics and Engineering
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• v.24 no.5
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• pp.491-503
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• 2021

Shallow tunnels are vulnerable to earthquakes, and shallow ground is usually inhomogeneous. Based on the limit equilibrium method and variational principle, a solution for the seismic collapse mechanism of shallow tunnel in inhomogeneous ground is presented. And the finite difference method is employed to compare with the analytical solution. It shows that the analytical results are conservative when the horizontal and vertical stresses equal the static earth pressure and zero at vault section, respectively. The safety factor of shallow tunnel changes greatly during an earthquake. Hence, the cyclic loading characteristics should be considered to evaluate tunnel stability. And the curve sliding surface agrees with the numerical simulation and previous studies. To save time and ensure accuracy, the curve sliding surface with 2 undetermined constants is a good choice to analyze shallow tunnel stability. Parameter analysis demonstrates that the horizontal semiaxis, acceleration, ground cohesion and homogeneity affect tunnel stability greatly, and the horizontal semiaxis, vertical semiaxis, tunnel depth and ground homogeneity have obvious influence on tunnel sliding surface. It concludes that the most applicable approaches to enhance tunnel stability are reducing the horizontal semiaxis, strengthening cohesion and setting the tunnel into good ground.

• Journal of the Korean Geotechnical Society
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• v.26 no.6
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• pp.57-70
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• 2010

Recent earthquakes have demonstrated that the tunnels, which were once considered to be highly resistant to earthquakes, are susceptible to substantial damage under severe seismic loading. Among various modes of deformation under an earthquake loading, the response of the tunnel in the transverse direction is known to be the critical mode. This paper investigates the seismic response of the tunnel in the transverse direction using the method of seismic displacement, which is a type of pseudo-static analysis. Firstly, the methods of calculating the ground deformation are compared. It is shown that the single and double cosine may not provide an accurate estimation of the ground deformation, and that a one-dimensional site response analysis needs to be performed for a more reliable evaluation. Secondly, the tunnel responses are calculated using the simplified, analytical, and numerical solutions. It is demonstrated that the simplified method provides poor estimates of the tunnel response ground deformation. The analytical solution is shown to be effective in modeling circular tunnels in uniform ground, but has serious limitation in modeling tunnel response in non-uniform ground. Numerical analyses are shown to be applicable to all cases, and give the most accurate estimates of the tunnel response. It is also demonstrated that the linear solutions can be so conservative that the soil nonlinearity needs to be accounted for more accurate evaluation of the tunnel response.

• Computers and Concrete
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• v.27 no.2
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• pp.163-173
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• 2021

In this paper, the parameters of haunch height, reinforcement ratio and site condition were evaluated for the influence on the seismic performance of a composite precast fabricated utility tunnel by shaking table test and numerical simulation. The dynamic response laws of acceleration, interlayer displacement and steel strain under unidirectional horizontal seismic excitation were analyzed through four specimens with a similarity ratio of 1:6 in the test. And a numerical model was established and analyzed by the finite element software ABAQUS based on the structure of utility tunnel. The results indicated that composite precast fabricated utility tunnel with the good anti-seismic performance. In a certain range, increasing the height of haunch or the ratio of reinforcement could reduce the influence of seismic wave on the utility tunnel structure, which was beneficial to the structure earthquake resistance. The clay field containing the interlayer of liquefied sandy soil has a certain damping effect on the structure of the utility tunnel, and the displacement response could be reduced by 14.1%. Under the excitation of strong earthquake, the reinforcement strain at the side wall upper end and haunches of the utility tunnel was the biggest, which is the key part of the structure. The experimental results were in good agreement with the fitting results, and the results could provide a reference value for the anti-seismic design and application of composite precast fabricated utility tunnel.

• Journal of Korean Tunnelling and Underground Space Association
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• v.4 no.4
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• pp.319-332
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• 2002

Domestic masonry railroad tunnel lining consists of red bricks or granite stone blocks and mortar. It is necessary to evaluate the behaviour of the masonry tunnel lining during an earthquake because the lining was constructed without the consideration of seismic loads. In this study, a methodology to evaluate the seismic resistant capacity of masonry tunnel linings was proposed, i.e. material property evaluation and seismic analysis technique. The red brick masonry tunnel lining is arrayed with multi-layers composed of 3 to 5 bricks depending on ground conditions and each brick is attached with mortar. Equivalent property concept was adopted to consider the stiffness difference among the red brick material itself and joints between bricks. Response spectrum analysis was performed by considering ground-structure interactions. A parametric study was performed to figure out the effect of relative stiffness between the lining and rock mass on the seismic behavior. A resonable countermeasure to minimize the earthquake-induced damage was also proposed.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.24 no.1
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• pp.65-79
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• 2023

A simplified analytical solution for seismic response of tunnel cross section in horizontally layered ground subjected to oblique incidence of SH wave is deduced in this paper. The proposed analytical solution consists of two main steps: free-field response in layered field and tunnel response. The free field responses of the layered ground are obtained by one-dimensional finite element method in time domain. The tunnel lining is treated as a thick-wall cylinder to calculate the tunnel response, which subject to free field stress. The analytical solutions are verified by comparing with the dynamic numerical results of two-dimensional ground-lining interaction analysis under earthquake in some common situations, which have a good agreement. Then, the appropriate range of the proposed analytical solution is analyzed, considering the height of the layered ground, the wavelength and incident angle of SH wave. Finally, by using the analytical solutions, the effects of the ground material, burial depth of the tunnel, and lining thickness and the slippage effect at the ground-lining interface on the seismic response of tunnels are investigated. The proposed solution could serve as a useful tool for seismic analysis and design of tunnels in layered ground.

• Geomechanics and Engineering
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• v.18 no.6
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• pp.639-650
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• 2019

Time-domain commercial codes are widely used to evaluate the seismic behavior of tunnels. Those tools offer a good insight into the performance and the failure mechanism of tunnels under earthquake loading. Viscous damping is generally employed in the dynamic analysis to consider damping at very small strains in some cases, and the Rayleigh damping is commonly used one. Many procedures to obtain the damping parameters have been proposed but they are seldom discussed. This paper illustrates the influence of the Rayleigh damping formulation on the tunnel visco-elastic behavior under earthquake. Four Rayleigh damping determination procedures and three soil shear velocity profiles are accounted for. The results show significant differences in the free-field and in the tunnel response caused by different procedures. The difference is somewhat decreased when the soil site fundamental frequency is increased. The conventional method which consists of using solely the first soil natural mode to determine the viscous damping parameters may lead to an unsafe seismic design of the tunnel. In general, using five times site fundamental frequency to obtain the damping formulation can provide relatively conservative results.

• Journal of Korean Tunnelling and Underground Space Association
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• v.17 no.6
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• pp.695-702
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• 2015

Recently, the improvement of mechanical and theoretical issues in geo-centrifuge test enhances the applicability and accuracy of the test. Geo-centrifuge test is appropriate to simulate the behaviors of underground structures like tunnel, since tunnel interacts with the soil and/or rock around it and the test can embody the in-situ stress conditions effectively. In this study, the seismic behaviors of twin tunnel were analyzed based on geo-centrifuge test. Flexible segment to mitigate seismic acceleration were implemented in the model with thin and thick thickness. Based on the test results, it was found that flexible segment can decrease the peak acceleration generally, however, thin flexible segment was not able to reduce peak acceleration in short-period seismic wave. Thick flexible segment was more effective in case of high bedrock acceleration condition. Additionally, 3-dimensional numerical analysis was performed to verify the characteristics of seismic behavior and the effect of flexible segment. Consequently, the numerical analysis result showed good agreement with the test result.