• Smart Structures and Systems
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• v.25 no.1
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• pp.47-56
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• 2020

This paper proposes a model-based approach for structural damage identification and quantification. Using pseudo modal strain energy and mode shape vectors, a damage-sensitive objective function is introduced which is suitable for damage estimation and quantification in shear frames. Whale optimization algorithm (WOA) is used to solve the problem and report the optimal solution as damage detection results. To illustrate the capability of the proposed method, a numerical example of a shear frame under different damage patterns is studied in both ideal and noisy cases. Furthermore, the performance of the WOA is compared with particle swarm optimization algorithm, as one the widely-used optimization techniques. The applicability of the method is also experimentally investigated by studying a six-story shear frame tested on a shake table. Based on the obtained results, the proposed method is able to assess the health of the shear building structures with high level of accuracy.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.19 no.1
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• pp.29-44
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• 2020

The effectiveness and the sensitivity of a Wireless impedance/Admittance Monitoring System (WiAMS) for the prompt damage diagnosis of two single-storey single-span Reinforced Concrete (RC) frames under cyclic loading is experimentally investigated. The geometrical and the reinforcement characteristics of the RC structural members of the frames represent typical old RC frame structure without consideration of seismic design criteria. The columns of the frames are vulnerable to shear failure under lateral load due to their low height-to-depth ratio and insufficient transverse reinforcement. The proposed Structural Health Monitoring (SHM) system comprises of specially manufactured autonomous portable devices that acquire the in-situ voltage frequency responses of a network of twenty piezoelectric transducers mounted to the RC frames. Measurements of external and internal small-sized piezoelectric patches are utilized for damage localization and assessment at various and increased damage levels as the magnitude of the imposed lateral cycle deformations increases. A bare RC frame and a strengthened one using a pair of steel crossed tension-ties (X-bracing) have been tested in order to check the sensitivity of the developed WiAMS in different structural conditions since crack propagation, damage locations and failure mode of the examined frames vary. Indeed, the imposed loading caused brittle shear failure to the column of the bare frame and the formation of plastic hinges at the beam ends of the X-braced frame. Test results highlighted the ability of the proposed SHM to identify incipient damages due to concrete cracking and steel yielding since promising early indication of the forthcoming critical failures before any visible sign has been obtained.

• Korea Journal of Cosmetic Science
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• v.2 no.1
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• pp.1-10
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• 2020

Protection mechanisms for skin damage of ultraviolet (UV) absorbers in personal care products for protection against UV are well studied, but not for hair protection. The purpose of this study is to describe and compare the changes of physical property produced in human hair by doses of the UV-B exposure causing protein degradation. To observe the change of physical properties in hair, the experimental intensity of UV-B exposure has been established on the basis of statistical data from official meterological administration as daily one hour sunlight exposure for two weeks. Polysilicone-15, ethylhexyl methoxycinnamate (OMC), and octocrylene were employed for UV-B absorber, and those were treated to hair swatch by rubbing wash through shampoo and conditioner. Bending rigidity displayed kinetically successive reduction at high doses of UV exposure up to the 8,000 s, and exhibited different level at each sample of UV-B absorber. However, the values of Bossa Nova Technologies (BNT) for shinning factor were already saturable at the 2,000 s exposure except that treated with polysilicone-15. The differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) to measure a strength of inner protein produces a successive reduction of enthalpy as like a reduction of bending rigidity upon UV exposure. Surface roughness from lateral force microscope (LFM) acquired immediately after UV exposure show a saturable frictional voltage which has been also found in a saturable BNT data as the time of UV exposure increases. Through researching the DSC and the LFM, shinning of hair was much correlated to the protein damage at the surface, and bending rigidity could be regulated by the protein structural damage inside hair. Therefore, the optimization of efficient strategy for simultaneous prevention of hair protein on the surface and internal hair was required to maintain physical properties against UV.

• Smart Structures and Systems
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• v.29 no.1
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• pp.41-51
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• 2022

Cables are critical components of cable-stayed bridges. A structural health monitoring system provides real-time cable tension recording for cable health monitoring. However, the measurement data involve multiple sources of variability, i.e., varying environmental and operational factors, which increase the complexity of cable condition monitoring. In this study, a one-class classification method is developed for cable condition assessment using Bayesian factor analysis (FA). The single-peaked vehicle-induced cable tension is assumed to be relevant to vehicle positions and weights. The Bayesian FA is adopted to establish the correlation model between cable tensions and vehicles. Vehicle weights are assumed to be latent variables and the influences of different transverse positions are quantified by coefficient parameters. The Bayesian theorem is employed to estimate the parameters and variables automatically, and the damage index is defined on the basis of the well-trained model. The proposed method is applied to one cable-stayed bridge for cable damage detection. Significant deviations of the damage indices of Cable SJS11 were observed, indicating a damaged condition in 2011. This study develops a novel method to evaluate the health condition of individual cable using the FA in the Bayesian framework. Only vehicle-induced cable tensions are used and there is no need to monitor the vehicles. The entire process, including the data pre-processing, model training and damage index calculation of one cable, takes only 35 s, which is highly efficient.

• Korean Journal of Medicinal Crop Science
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• v.17 no.4
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• pp.273-279
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• 2009

GATA-binding protein-3 (GATA-3) and T-box expressed in T-cells (T-bet) are now considered as master transcription factors involving Th cell differentiation, but the roles of these factors are still uncertain in vivo. This study was conducted to investigate the expression of these transcription factors in the liver damage induced by carbon tetrachloride ($CCl_4$) in rats. In this study, liver damage were induced with Scutellaria baicalensis Georgi water extracts (SBW) and followed for 4 weeks. The expression of GATA-3 and T-bet protein in liver damage induced by $CCl_4$ and the serum levels of immunoglobulin A (IgA), IgE were studied after 4 weeks of treatment. We found that effect of SBW on IFN-$\gamma$, STAT1, pSTAT1 and T-bet was decreased in vivo. Several genes were demonstrated to be IL-4 inducible prior to the discovery of STAT6. $CCl_4$+SBW group was significantly lower than $CCl_4$ group in IL-4, STAT6, pSTAT6 and GATA-3. Our data indicate that cytokine protein production were increased in $CCl_4$ group and $CCl_4$+SBW group. From these results, water extracts obtained from Scutellaria baicalensis Georgi may have an immunoregulatory effect in the liver induced by $CCl_4$ of rats.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.16 no.14
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• pp.6047-6053
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• 2015

Background: Hepatocellular carcinoma is one of the most common cancers worldwide. Its prevalence is increasing in many countries. Plant products can be used to protect against cancer due to natural anticancer and chemopreventive constituents. Strobilanthes crispus is one of plants with potential chemopreventive ability. Objective: This study aimed to evaluate the anticancer effects of Strobilanthes crispus juice on hepatocellular carcinoma cells. Materials and Methods: MTT assays, flow cytometry, comet assays and the reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) were used to determine the effects of juice on DNA damage and cancer cell numbers. Results: This juice induced apoptosis after exposure of the HepG2 cell line for 72 h. High percentages of apoptotic cell death and DNA damage were seen at the juice concentrations above 0.1%. It was found that the juice was not toxic for normal cells. In addition, juice exposure increased the expression level of c-myc gene and reduced the expression level of c-fos and c-erbB2 genes in HepG2 cells. The cytotoxic effects of juice on abnormal cells were in dose dependent. Conclusions: It was concluded that the Strobilanthes crispus juice may have chemopreventive effects on hepatocellular carcinoma cells.

• Smart Structures and Systems
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• v.3 no.2
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• pp.201-217
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• 2007

An active damage detection technique is introduced to locate damage in an isotropic plate using Lamb waves. This technique uses a time-domain energy model of Lamb waves in plates that the wave amplitude inversely decays with the propagation distance along a ray direction. Accordingly the damage localization is formulated as a least-squares problem to minimize an error function between the model and the measured data. An active sensing system with integrated actuators/sensors is controlled to excite/receive $A_0$ mode of Lamb waves in the plate. Scattered wave signals from the damage can be obtained by subtracting the baseline signal of the undamaged plate from the recorded signal of the damaged plate. In the experimental study, after collecting the scattered wave signals, a discrete wavelet transform (DWT) is employed to extract the first scattered wave pack from the damage, then an iterative method is derived to solve the least-squares problem for locating the damage. Since this method does not rely on time-of-flight but wave energy measurement, it is more robust, reliable, and noise-tolerant. Both numerical and experimental examples are performed to verify the efficiency and accuracy of the method, and the results demonstrate that the estimated damage position stably converges to the targeted damage.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.54 no.2
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• pp.337-362
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• 2015

This paper presents a feasibility study on structural damage alarming and localization of long-span cable-supported bridges using multi-novelty indices formulated by monitoring-derived modal parameters. The proposed method which requires neither structural model nor damage model is applicable to structures of arbitrary complexity. With the intention to enhance the tolerance to measurement noise/uncertainty and the sensitivity to structural damage, an improved novelty index is formulated in terms of auto-associative neural networks (ANNs) where the output vector is designated to differ from the input vector while the training of the ANNs needs only the measured modal properties of the intact structure under in-service conditions. After validating the enhanced capability of the improved novelty index for structural damage alarming over the commonly configured novelty index, the performance of the improved novelty index for damage occurrence detection of large-scale bridges is examined through numerical simulation studies of the suspension Tsing Ma Bridge (TMB) and the cable-stayed Ting Kau Bridge (TKB) incurred with different types of structural damage. Then the improved novelty index is extended to formulate multi-novelty indices in terms of the measured modal frequencies and incomplete modeshape components for damage region identification. The capability of the formulated multi-novelty indices for damage region identification is also examined through numerical simulations of the TMB and TKB.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.11 no.5
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• pp.841-859
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• 2016

Bridge bearings are important connection elements between bridge superstructures and substructures, whose health states directly affect the performance of the bridges. This paper systematacially presents a new method to identify the bridge bearing damage based on the neural network theory. Firstly, based on the analysis of different damage types, a description of the bearing damage is introduced, and a uniform description for all the damage types is given. Then, the feasibility and sensitivity of identifying the bearing damage with bridge vibration modes are investigated. After that, a Radial Basis Function Neural Network (RBFNN) is built, whose input and output are the beam modal information and the damage information, respectively. Finally, trained by plenty of data samples formed by the numerical method, the network is employed to identify the bearing damage. Results show that the bridge bearing damage can be clearly reflected by the modal information of the bridge beam, which validates the effectiveness of the proposed method.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.77 no.2
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• pp.151-165
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• 2021

This paper aims to present a novelty damage detection method to identify damage locations by the simultaneous use of both the energy and displacement damage indices. Using this novelty method, the damaged location and even the damaged floor are accurately detected. As a first method, a combination of the instantaneous frequency energy index (EDI) and the structural acceleration responses are used. To evaluate the first method and also present a rapid assessment method, the Displacement Damage Index (DDI), which consists of the error reliability (β) and Normal Probability Density Function (NPDF) indices, are introduced. The innovation of this method is the simultaneous use of displacement-acceleration responses during one process, which is more effective in the rapid evaluation of damage patterns with velocity vectors. In order to evaluate the effectiveness of the proposed method, various damage scenarios of the ASCE benchmark problem, and the effects of measurement noise were studied numerically. Extensive analyses show that the rapid proposed method is capable of accurately detecting the location of sparse damages through the building. Finally, the proposed method was validated by experimental studies of a six-story steel building structure with single and multiple damage cases.