• Smart Structures and Systems
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• v.18 no.2
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• pp.293-315
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• 2016

Seismic isolation is often used in protecting mission-critical structures including hospitals, data centers, telecommunication buildings, etc. Such structures typically house vibration-sensitive equipment which has to provide continued service but may fail in case sustained accelerations during earthquakes exceed threshold limit values. Thus, peak floor acceleration is one of the two main parameters that control the design of such structures while the other one is peak base displacement since the overall safety of the structure depends on the safety of the isolation system. And in case peak base displacement exceeds the design base displacement during an earthquake, rupture and/or buckling of isolators as well as bumping against stops around the seismic gap may occur. Therefore, obtaining accurate peak floor accelerations and peak base displacement is vital. However, although nominal design values for isolation system and superstructure parameters are calculated in order to meet target peak design base displacement and peak floor accelerations, their actual values may potentially deviate from these nominal design values. In this study, the sensitivity of the seismic performance of structures equipped with linear and nonlinear seismic isolation systems to the aforementioned potential deviations is assessed in the context of a benchmark shear building under different earthquake records with near-fault and far-fault characteristics. The results put forth the degree of sensitivity of peak top floor acceleration and peak base displacement to superstructure parameters including mass, stiffness, and damping and isolation system parameters including stiffness, damping, yield strength, yield displacement, and post-yield to pre-yield stiffness ratio.

• Journal of Korean Association for Spatial Structures
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• v.11 no.4
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• pp.109-119
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• 2011

To date, a smart base isolation system has been developed in high seismicity region such as Japan, USA etc. Smart base isolation systems developed for structures in high seismicity region cannot directly applied to structures in regions of low-to-moderate seismicity such as Korea. Therefore, problems that occur by applying the smart base isolation system developed for the structures in high seismicity region to the structures in regions of low-to-moderate seismicity have been investigated in this study. To this end, a spacial arch structure was used as an example structure and MR dampers and low damping elastomeric bearings were used to compose a smart base isolation system. Artificial earthquakes were used for ground motions in regions of high and low-to-moderate seismicity. Based on numerical simulation results, it has been known that the capacity of smart base isolation system for the regions of low-to-moderate seismicity should be carefully designed because the base isolation effects of the smart base isolation system for high seismicity region is deteriorated when it is applied to the structures in regions of low-to-moderate seismicity.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Safety
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• v.37 no.3
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• pp.45-51
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• 2022

This paper focuses on a recently proposed asymmetric base-isolation coupling control system (ABiCS) for the vibration control of adjacent twin buildings. The ABiCS consists of inter-story diagonal dampers, a connecting damper between the two buildings, and a seismic isolation device at the base floor of one building. To investigate the control characteristics of ABiCS, a parametric study was performed by numerically simulating the 20-story twin buildings. In the parametric study, the control capacities of the inter-story diagonal dampers, connecting damper, and seismic isolation device were considered as varying parameters. The parametric study results indicate that the connecting damper between the two buildings reduces the responses of both buildings only at optimal or near-optimal capacity. In addition, adjusting the stiffness of the base isolation is found to be the most effective method for improving seismic performance and achieving cost-effectiveness. Accordingly, we presented a scenario-based performance improvement approach in which reducing the stiffness of the base isolation device could be an effective technique to improve the seismic performance of both buildings. However, note that checking the maximum allowable displacement of the base isolation device is essential.

• Journal of Korean Association for Spatial Structures
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• v.18 no.3
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• pp.37-44
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• 2018

A base isolation system is widely used to reduce seismic responses of low-rise buildings. This system cannot be effectively applied to high-rise buildings because the initial stiffness of the high-rise building with the base isolation system maintains almost the same as the building without the base isolation system to set the yield shear force of the base isolation system larger than the design wind load. To solve this problem, the mid-story isolation system was proposed and applied to many buildings. The mid-story isolation system has two major objectives; first to reduce peak story drift and second to reduce peak drift of the isolation story. Usually, these two objectives are in conflict. In this study, a hybrid mid-story isolation system for a tall building is proposed. A MR (magnetorheological) damper was used to develop the hybrid mid-story isolation system. An existing building with mid-story isolation system, that is "Shiodome Sumitomo Building" a high rise building having a large atrium in the lower levels, was used for control performance evaluation of the hybrid mid-story isolation system. Fuzzy logic controller and genetic algorithm were used to develop the control algorithm for the hybrid mid-story isolation system. It can be seen from analytical results that the hybrid mid-story isolation system can provide better control performance than the ordinary mid-story isolation system and the design process developed in this study is useful for preliminary design of the hybrid mid-story isolation system for a tall building.

• Journal of Korean Association for Spatial Structures
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• v.16 no.4
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• pp.37-44
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• 2016

The seismic isolation system reduces the seismic vibration that is transmitted from foundation to upper structure. This seismic isolation system can be classified into base isolation and mid-story isolation by the installation location. In this study, the seismic behavior of dome structure with mid-story isolation is analyzed to verify the effect of seismic isolation. Mid-story isolation is more effective than base isolation to reduce the seismic responses of roof structure. Also, this isolation would be excellent in structural characteristics and construction.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.11 no.6
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• pp.1101-1121
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• 2016

Base isolation, one of the popular seismic protection approaches proven to be effective in practical applications, has been widely applied worldwide during the past few decades. As the techniques mature, it has been recognised that, the biggest issue faced in base isolation technique is the challenge of great base displacement demand, which leads to the potential of overturning of the structure, instability and permanent damage of the isolators. Meanwhile, drain, ventilation and regular maintenance at the base isolation level are quite difficult and rather time- and fund- consuming, especially in the highly populated areas. To address these challenges, a number of efforts have been dedicated to propose new isolation systems, including segmental building, additional storey isolation (ASI) and mid-storey isolation system, etc. However, such techniques have their own flaws, among which whipping effect is the most obvious one. Moreover, due to their inherent passive nature, all these techniques, including traditional base isolation system, show incapability to cope with the unpredictable and diverse nature of earthquakes. The solution for the aforementioned challenge is to develop an innovative vibration isolation system to realise variable structural stiffness to maximise the adaptability and controllability of the system. Recently, advances on the development of an adaptive magneto-rheological elastomer (MRE) vibration isolator has enlightened the development of adaptive base isolation systems due to its ability to alter stiffness by changing applied electrical current. In this study, an innovative semi-active storey isolation system inserting such novel MRE isolators between each floor is proposed. The stiffness of each level in the proposed isolation system can thus be changed according to characteristics of the MRE isolators. Non-dominated sorting genetic algorithm type II (NSGA-II) with dynamic crowding distance (DCD) is utilised for the optimisation of the parameters at isolation level in the system. Extensive comparative simulation studies have been conducted using 5-storey benchmark model to evaluate the performance of the proposed isolation system under different earthquake excitations. Simulation results compare the seismic responses of bare building, building with passive controlled MRE base isolation system, building with passive-controlled MRE storey isolation system and building with optimised storey isolation system.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.88 no.3
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• pp.263-271
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• 2023

Base isolation is a widely used technique for the seismic control of structures as it reduces the structural seismic demand. However, displacement of the isolation layer is not economically feasible in congested urban areas. To resolve the issue, an innovative system is proposed here to isolate both horizontally at the base and vertically in the upper portion of the structure. A simplified linear three degree-of-freedom (3DOF) model of the system that considers the mass and stiffness ratios of the substructure has been introduced and analyzed in MATLAB by spectrum analysis. The 3DOF model results revealed that, when the period of the soft substructure reaches 2.5 times that of the stiff substructure, the isolation and the lower substructure responses decrease by 65% and 51%, respectively. Time-history analysis of a MDOF system at three frequency ratios under a wide range of ground motions indicated that, at the expense of accepting a certain large drift by the soft substructure in the upper portion of the structure, base isolation displacement can be decreased by 10%.

• Proceedings of the Earthquake Engineering Society of Korea Conference
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• 2002.09a
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• pp.98-105
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• 2002

The effects of the base-isolation system and elastic soil foundation on the behavior of a liquid storage tank are studied. To evaluate the seismic response of liquid storage tank accurately, the coupled dynamic system considering base isolation and soil interaction problem is formulated in time domain. Results show that the base isolation system reduces effectively the radial displacements, base shears, overturning moments, axial resultant stresses and the hydrodynamic pressure by providing flexibility and energy dissipation capability. Base Isolation may, however, increase the relative liquid sloshing amplitude due to the effect of liquid-structure interaction and cause excessive large relative displacements between structure and foundation. In addition to base-isolator, the dynamic behavior of liquid storage tank is related to the flexibility of base foundation, so the analysis of soil-structure interaction s achieved.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.40 no.4
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• pp.285-298
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• 2008

This study evaluates the performance of a coil spring-viscous damper system for the vibration and seismic isolation of an Emergency Diesel Generator (EDG) by measuring its operational vibration and seismic responses. The vibration performance of a coil spring-viscous damper system was evaluated by the vibration measurements for an identical EDG set with different base systems - one with an anchor bolt system and the other with a coil spring-viscous damper system. The seismic performance of the coil spring-viscous damper system was evaluated by seismic tests with a scaled model of a base-isolated EDG on a shaking table. The effects of EDG base isolation on the fragility curve and core damage frequency in a nuclear power plant were also investigated through a case study.

• Journal of the Computational Structural Engineering Institute of Korea
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• v.21 no.6
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• pp.597-605
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• 2008

The feasibility study of a newly proposed smart base isolation system employing magneto-rheological elastomers(MREs) has been carried out. MREs belong to a class of smart materials whose elastic modulus or stiffness can be adjusted by varying the magnitude of the magnetic field. The base isolation systems are considered as one of the most effective devices for vibration mitigation of civil engineering structures such as bridges and buildings in the event of earthquakes. The proposed base isolation system strives to enhance the performance of the conventional base isolation system by improving the robustness of the system wide stiffness range controllable of MREs, which improves the adaptability and helps in better vibration control. To validate the effectiveness of the MRE-based isolation system, an extensive numerical simulation study has been performed using both single-story and five-story building structures employing base isolated devices under several historical earthquake excitations. The results show that the proposed system outperformed the conventional system in reducing the responses of the structure in all the seismic excitations considered in the study.