• Proceedings of the Korean Geotechical Society Conference
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• 2006.03a
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• pp.625-633
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• 2006

Spatial variability of ground motions has significant influence on dynamic response of longitudinal structures such as bridges and tunnels. The coherency function, which quantifies the degree of positive or negative correlation between two ground motions, is often used to describe the spatially variable ground motions. This paper compares two available procedures for developing spatially variable ground time histories from a given coherency function. Hao's method shows serious limitation, resulting in unrealistic decrease in coherency with increase in distance Abrahamason's method, on the other hand, preserves important characteristics of the reference ground motion. Therefore, the Abrahamason's method is recommended to be used in developing spatially varying ground motions.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.17 no.6
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• pp.557-566
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• 2019

The evaluation of the seismic hazard for a given site is to estimate the seismic ground motion at the surface. This is the result of the combination of the action of the seismic source, which generates seismic waves, the propagation of these waves between the source and the site, and site local conditions. The aim of this work is to evaluate the sensitivity of dynamic response of extended structures to spatial variable ground motions (SVGM). All factors of spatial variability of ground motion are considered, especially local site effect. In this paper, a method is presented to simulate spatially varying earthquake ground motions. The scheme for generating spatially varying ground motions is established for spatial locations on the ground surface with varying site conditions. In this proposed method, two steps are necessary. Firstly, the base rock motions are assumed to have the same intensity and are modelled with a filtered Tajimi-Kanai power spectral density function. An empirical coherency loss model is used to define spatial variable seismic ground motions at the base rock. In the second step, power spectral density function of ground motion on surface is derived by considering site amplification effect based on the one dimensional seismic wave propagation theory. Several dynamics analysis of a curved viaduct to various cases of spatially varying seismic ground motions are performed. For comparison, responses to uniform ground motion, to spatial ground motions without considering local site effect, to spatial ground motions with considering coherency loss, phase delay and local site effects are also calculated. The results showed that the generated seismic signals are strongly conditioned by the local site effect. In the same sense, the dynamic response of the viaduct is very sensitive of the variation of local geological conditions of the site. The effect of neglecting local site effect in dynamic analysis gives rise to a significant underestimation of the seismic demand of the structure.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.65 no.5
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• pp.633-644
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• 2018

This paper presents the results of an assessment of the seismic fragility of a long, curved multi-frame bridge under multi-support earthquake excitations. To achieve this aim, the numerical model of columns retrofitted with elliptical steel jackets was developed and validated using existing experimental results. A detailed nonlinear numerical model of the bridge that can capture the inelastic response of various components was then created. Using nonlinear time-history analyses for a set of stochastically generated spatially variable ground motions, component demands were derived and then convolved with new capacity-based limit state models to obtain seismic fragility curves. The comparison of failure probabilities obtained from uniform and multi-support excitation analyses revealed that the consideration of spatial variability significantly reduced the median value of fragility curves for most components except for the abutments. This observation indicates that the assumption of uniform motions may considerably underestimate seismic demands. Moreover, the spatial correlation of ground motions resulted in reduced dispersion of demand models that consequently decreased the dispersion of fragility curves for all components. Therefore, the spatial variability of ground motions needs to be considered for reliable assessment of the seismic performance of long multi-frame bridge structures.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.33 no.4
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• pp.407-428
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• 2009

The effects of the uniform and spatially varying ground motions on the stochastic response of fluid-structure interaction system during an earthquake are investigated by using the displacement based fluid finite elements in this paper. For this purpose, variable-number-nodes two-dimensional fluid finite elements based on the Lagrangian approach is programmed in FORTRAN language and incorporated into a general-purpose computer program SVEM, which is used for stochastic dynamic analysis of solid systems under spatially varying earthquake ground motion. The spatially varying earthquake ground motion model includes wave-passage, incoherence and site-response effects. The effect of the wave-passage is considered by using various wave velocities. The incoherence effect is examined by considering the Harichandran-Vanmarcke and Luco-Wong coherency models. Homogeneous medium and firm soil types are selected for considering the site-response effect where the foundation supports are constructed. A concrete gravity dam is selected for numerical example. The S16E component recorded at Pacoima dam during the San Fernando Earthquake in 1971 is used as a ground motion. Three different analysis cases are considered for spatially varying ground motion. Displacements, stresses and hydrodynamic pressures occurring on the upstream face of the dam are calculated for each case and compare with those of uniform ground motion. It is concluded that spatially varying earthquake ground motions have important effects on the stochastic response of fluid-structure interaction systems.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.4 no.5
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• pp.509-525
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• 2013

In this paper, learning capabilities of two types of Arterial Neural Networks, namely hierarchical neural networks and Generalized Regression Neural Network were used in a two-stage approach to develop a method for generating spatial varying accelerograms from acceleration response spectra and a distance parameter in which generated accelerogram is desired. Data collected from closely spaced arrays of seismographs in SMART-1 array were used to train neural networks. The generated accelerograms from the proposed method can be used for multiple support excitations analysis of structures that their supports undergo different motions during an earthquake.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.70 no.2
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• pp.143-152
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• 2019

In this study, stochastic responses of a cable-stayed bridge subjected to the spatially varying earthquake ground motion are investigated for variable local soil cases and wave velocities. Quincy Bay-view cable-stayed bridge built on the Mississippi River in Illinois, USA selected as a numerical example. The bridge is composed of two H-shaped concrete towers, double plane fan type cables and a composite concrete-steel girder deck. The spatial variability of the ground motion is considered with the coherency function, which is represented by the components of incoherence, wave-passage and site-response effects. The incoherence effect is investigated by considering Harichandran and Vanmarcke model, the site-response effect is outlined by using hard, medium and soft soil types, and the wave-passage effect is taken into account by using 1000, 600 and 200 m/s wave velocities for the hard, medium and soft soils, respectively. Mean of maximum response values obtained from the analyses are compared with those of the specific cases of the ground motion model. It is concluded that the obtained results from the bridge model increase as the differences between local soil conditions cases of the bridge supports change from firm to soft. Moreover, the variation of the wave velocity has important effects on the responses of the deck and towers as compared with those of the travelling constant wave velocity case. In addition, the variability of the ground motions should be considered in the analysis of long span cable-stayed bridges to obtain more accurate results in calculating the bridge responses.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.8 no.5
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• pp.1241-1254
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• 2015

Spatially variable ground motions can be significant on the seismic response of a structure due to the incoherency of the incident wave. Incoherence of the incident wave is resulted from wave passage and wave scattering. In this study, wave passage effect on the response spectrum of a building structure built on a soft soil layer was investigated utilizing a finite element program of P3DASS (Pseudo 3-dimensional Dynamic Analysis of a Structure-soil System). P3DASS was developed for the axisymmetric problem in the cylindrical coordinate, but it is modified to apply anti-symmetric input earthquake motions. Study results were compared with the experimental results to verify the reliability of P3DASS program for the shear wave velocity of 250 m/s and the apparent shear wave velocities of 2000-3500 m/s. Studied transfer functions of input motions between surface mat foundation and free ground surface were well-agreed to the experimental ones with a small difference in all frequency ranges, showing some reductions of the transfer function in the high frequency range. Also wave passage effect on the elastic response spectrum reduced the elastic seismic response of a SDOF system somewhat in the short period range.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.3 no.3_4
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• pp.341-363
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• 2012

The spectral representation method is a quick and versatile tool for the generation of spatially variable, response-spectrum-compatible simulations to be used in the nonlinear seismic response evaluation of extended structures, such as bridges. However, just as recorded data, these simulated accelerations require processing, but, unlike recorded data, the reasons for their processing are purely numerical. Hence, the criteria for the processing of acceleration simulations need to be tied to the effect of processing on the structural response. This paper presents a framework for processing acceleration simulations that is based on seismological approaches for processing recorded data, but establishes the corner frequency of the high-pass filter by minimizing the effect of processing on the response of the structural system, for the response evaluation of which the ground motions were generated. The proposed two-step criterion selects the filter corner frequency by considering both the dynamic and the pseudo-static response of the systems. First, it ensures that the linear/nonlinear dynamic structural response induced by the processed simulations captures the characteristics of the system's dynamic response caused by the unprocessed simulations, the frequency content of which is fully compatible with the target response spectrum. Second, it examines the adequacy of the selected estimate for the filter corner frequency by evaluating the pseudo-static response of the system subjected to spatially variable excitations. It is noted that the first step of this two-fold criterion suffices for the establishment of the corner frequency for the processing of acceleration time series generated at a single ground-surface location to be used in the seismic response evaluation of, e.g. a building structure. Furthermore, the concept also applies for the processing of acceleration time series generated by means of any approach that does not provide physical considerations for the selection of the corner frequency of the high-pass filter.