• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• 제83권5호
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• pp.577-591
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• 2022

This paper develops a comparatively time-efficient methodology for performing seismic fragility analysis of the reinforced concrete (RC) buildings in the presence of uncertainty sources. It aims to appraise the effectiveness of any variation in the material's mechanical properties as epistemic uncertainty, and the record-to-record variation as aleatory uncertainty in structural response. In this respect, the fuzzy set theory, a well-known 𝛼-cut approach, and the Genetic Algorithm (GA) assess the median of collapse fragility curves as a fuzzy response. GA is requisite for searching the maxima and minima of the objective function (median fragility herein) in each membership degree, 𝛼. As this is a complicated and time-consuming process, the authors propose utilizing the Gene Expression Programming-based (GEP-based) equation for reducing the computational analysis time of the case study building significantly. The results indicate that the proposed structural analysis algorithm on the derived GEP model is able to compute the fuzzy median fragility about 33.3% faster, with errors less than 1%.

• Smart Structures and Systems
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• 제21권6호
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• pp.727-740
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• 2018

Tuned mass dampers (TMDs) are passive damping devices widely employed to mitigate the pedestrian-induced vibrations on footbridges. The TMD design must ensure an adequate performance during the overall life-cycle of the structure. Although the TMD is initially adjusted to match the natural frequency of the vibration mode which needs to be controlled, its design must further take into account the change of the modal parameters of the footbridge due to the modification of the operational and environmental conditions. For this purpose, a motion-based design optimization method is proposed and implemented herein, aimed at ensuring the adequate behavior of footbridges under uncertainty conditions. The uncertainty associated with the variation of such modal parameters is simulated by a probabilistic approach based on the results of previous research reported in literature. The pedestrian action is modelled according to the recommendations of the Synpex guidelines. A comparison among the TMD parameters obtained considering different design criteria, design requirements and uncertainty levels is performed. To illustrate the proposed approach, a benchmark footbridge is considered. Results show both which is the most adequate design criterion to control the pedestrian-induced vibrations on the footbridge and the influence of the design requirements and the uncertainty level in the final TMD design.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• 제76권4호
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• pp.529-540
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• 2020

Concurrent topology optimization of macrostructure and microstructure has attracted significant interest due to its high structural performance. However, most of the existing works are carried out under deterministic conditions, the obtained design may be vulnerable or even cause catastrophic failure when the load position exists uncertainty. Therefore, it is necessary to take load position uncertainty into consideration in structural design. This paper presents a computational method for robust concurrent topology optimization with consideration of load position uncertainty. The weighted sum of the mean and standard deviation of the structural compliance is defined as the objective function with constraints are imposed to both macro- and micro-scale structure volume fractions. The Bivariate Dimension Reduction method and Gauss-type quadrature (BDRGQ) are used to quantify and propagate load uncertainty to calculate the objective function. The effective properties of microstructure are evaluated by the numerical homogenization method. To release the computation burden, the decoupled sensitivity analysis method is proposed for microscale design variables. The bi-directional evolutionary structural optimization (BESO) method is used to obtain the black-and-white designs. Several 2D and 3D examples are presented to validate the effectiveness of the proposed robust concurrent topology optimization method.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• 제26권4호
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• pp.311-326
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• 2024

Transmission tower structures are particularly susceptible to damage and even collapse under strong seismic ground motions. Conventional seismic analyses of transmission towers are usually performed by considering only ground motion uncertainty while ignoring structural uncertainty; consequently, the performance evaluation and failure prediction may be inaccurate. In this context, the present study numerically investigates the seismic responses and failure mechanism of transmission towers by considering multiple sources of uncertainty. To this end, an existing transmission tower is chosen, and the corresponding three-dimensional finite element model is created in ABAQUS software. Sensitivity analysis is carried out to identify the relative importance of the uncertain parameters in the seismic responses of transmission towers. The numerical results indicate that the impacts of the structural damping ratio, elastic modulus and yield strength on the seismic responses of the transmission tower are relatively large. Subsequently, a set of 20 uncertainty models are established based on random samples of various parameter combinations generated by the Latin hypercube sampling (LHS) method. An uncertainty analysis is performed for these uncertainty models to clarify the impacts of uncertain structural factors on the seismic responses and failure mechanism (ultimate bearing capacity and failure path). The numerical results show that structural uncertainty has a significant influence on the seismic responses and failure mechanism of transmission towers; different possible failure paths exist for the uncertainty models, whereas only one exists for the deterministic model, and the ultimate bearing capacity of transmission towers is more sensitive to the variation in material parameters than that in geometrical parameters. This research is expected to provide an in-depth understanding of the influence of structural uncertainty on the seismic demand assessment of transmission towers.

• Geomechanics and Engineering
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• 제11권2호
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• pp.211-234
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• 2016

A total of 99 full-scale field load tests at 22 sites were compiled for this study to elucidate several issues related to the load-displacement behaviour of belled piers under axial uplift loading, including (1) interpretation criteria to define various elastic, inelastic, and "failure" states for each load test from the load-displacement curve; (2) generalized correlations among these states and determinations to the predicted ultimate uplift resistances; (3) uncertainty in the resistance model factor statistics required for reliability-based ultimate limit state (ULS) design; (4) uncertainty associated with the normalized load-displacement curves and the resulting model factor statistics required for reliability-based serviceability limit state (SLS) design; and (5) variations of the combined ULS and SLS model factor statistics for reliability-based limit state designs. The approaches discussed in this study are practical and grounded realistically on the load tests of belled piers with minimal assumptions. The results on the characterization and uncertainty of uplift load-displacement behaviour of belled piers could be served as to extend the early contributions for reliability-based ULS and SLS designs.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• 제8권4호
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• pp.915-934
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• 2015

Within the context of Structural Health Monitoring (SHM), it is often the case that structural systems are described by uncertainty, both with respect to their parameters and the characteristics of the input loads. For the purposes of system identification, efficient modeling procedures are of the essence for a fast and reliable computation of structural response while taking these uncertainties into account. In this work, a reduced order metamodeling framework is introduced for the challenging case of nonlinear structural systems subjected to earthquake excitation. The introduced metamodeling method is based on Nonlinear AutoRegressive models with eXogenous input (NARX), able to describe nonlinear dynamics, which are moreover characterized by random parameters utilized for the description of the uncertainty propagation. These random parameters, which include characteristics of the input excitation, are expanded onto a suitably defined finite-dimensional Polynomial Chaos (PC) basis and thus the resulting representation is fully described through a small number of deterministic coefficients of projection. The effectiveness of the proposed PC-NARX method is illustrated through its implementation on the metamodeling of a five-storey shear frame model paradigm for response in the region of plasticity, i.e., outside the commonly addressed linear elastic region. The added contribution of the introduced scheme is the ability of the proposed methodology to incorporate uncertainty into the simulation. The results demonstrate the efficiency of the proposed methodology for accurate prediction and simulation of the numerical model dynamics with a vast reduction of the required computational toll.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• 제17권2호
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• pp.131-141
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• 2019

Structural control systems have uncertainties in their structural parameters and control devices which by using reliability analysis, uncertainty can be modeled. In this paper, reliability of controlled structures equipped with semi-active Magneto-Rheological (MR) dampers is investigated. For this purpose, at first, the effect of the structural parameters and damper parameters on the reliability of the seismic responses are evaluated. Then, the reliability of MR damper force is considered for expected levels of performance. For sensitivity analysis of the parameters exist in Bouc- Wen model for predicting the damper force, the importance vector is utilized. The improved first-order reliability method (FORM), is used to reliability analysis. As a case study, an 11-story shear building equipped with 3 MR dampers is selected and numerically obtained experimental data of a 1000 kN MR damper is assumed to study the reliability of the MR damper performance for expected levels. The results show that the standard deviation of random variables affects structural reliability as an uncertainty factor. Thus, the effect of uncertainty existed in the structural model parameters on the reliability of the structure is more than the uncertainty in the damper parameters. Also, the reliability analysis of the MR damper performance show that to achieve the highest levels of nominal capacity of the damper, the probability of failure is greatly increased. Furthermore, by using sensitivity analysis, the Bouc-Wen model parameters which have great importance in predicting damper force can be identified.

• Structural Monitoring and Maintenance
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• 제9권1호
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• pp.59-80
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• 2022

In the present study, the objective is to detect the structural damages using the responses obtained from the sensors at the optimal location under uncertainty conditions. Reducing the error rate in damage detection process due to responses' noise is an important goal in this study. In the proposed algorithm for optimal sensor placement, the noise of responses recorded from the sensors is initially reduced using the principal component analysis. Afterward, the optimal sensor placement is obtained by the damage detection equation based sensitivity analysis. The sensors are placed on degrees of freedom corresponding to the minimum error rate in structural damage detection through this procedure. The efficiency of the proposed method is studied on a truss bridge, a space dome, a double-layer grid as well as a three-story experimental frame structure and the results are compared. Moreover, the performance of the suggested method is compared with three other algorithms of Average Driving Point Residue (ADPR), Effective Independence (EI) method, and a mass weighting version of EI. In the examples, young's modulus, density, and cross-sectional areas of the elements are considered as uncertainty parameters. Ultimately, the results have demonstrated that the presented algorithm under uncertainty conditions represents a high accuracy to obtain the optimal sensor placement in the structures.

• Structural Monitoring and Maintenance
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• 제5권3호
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• pp.379-390
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• 2018

In this paper, a novel and effective damage diagnosis algorithm is proposed to detect and estimate damage using two stages least squares support vector machine (LS-SVM) and limited number of attached sensors on structures. In the first stage, LS-SVM1 is used to predict the unmeasured mode shapes data based on limited measured modal data and in the second stage, LS-SVM2 is used to predicting the damage location and severity using the complete modal data from the first-stage LS-SVM1. The presented methods are applied to a three story irregular frame and cantilever plate. To investigate the noise effects and modeling errors, two uncertainty levels have been considered. Moreover, the performance of the proposed methods has been verified through using experimental modal data of a mass-stiffness system. The obtained damage identification results show the suitable performance of the proposed damage identification method for structures in spite of different uncertainty levels.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• 제46권3호
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• pp.433-445
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• 2013

Vibration-based structural identification has become an important tool for structural health monitoring and safety evaluation. However, various kinds of uncertainties (e.g., observation noise) involved in the field test data obstruct automation system identification for accurate and fast structural safety evaluation. A practical way including a data preprocessing procedure and a vector backward auto-regressive (VBAR) method has been investigated for practical bridge identification. The data preprocessing procedure serves to improve the data quality, which consists of multi-level uncertainty mitigation techniques. The VBAR method provides a determinative way to automatically distinguish structural modes from extraneous modes arising from uncertainty. Ambient test data of a cantilever beam is investigated to demonstrate how the proposed method automatically interprets vibration data for structural modal estimation. Especially, structural identification of a truss bridge using field test data is also performed to study the effectiveness of the proposed method for real bridge identification.