• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.11 no.6
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• pp.943-966
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• 2016

Recently, magnetorheological elastomer (MRE) material and its devices have been developed and attracted a good deal of attention for their potentials in vibration control. Among them, a highly adaptive base isolator based on MRE was designed, fabricated and tested for real-time adaptive control of base isolated structures against a suite of earthquakes. To perfectly take advantage of this new device, an accurate and robust model should be built to characterize its nonlinearity and hysteresis for its application in structural control. This paper first proposes a novel hysteresis model, in which a nonlinear hyperbolic sine function spring is used to portray the strain stiffening phenomenon and a Voigt component is incorporated in parallel to describe the solid-material behaviours. Then the fruit fly optimization algorithm (FFOA) is employed for model parameter identification using testing data of shear force, displacement and velocity obtained from different loading conditions. The relationships between model parameters and applied current are also explored to obtain a current-dependent generalized model for the control application. Based on the proposed model of MRE base isolator, a second-order sliding mode controller is designed and applied to the device to provide a real-time feedback control of smart structures. The performance of the proposed technique is evaluated in simulation through utilizing a three-storey benchmark building model under four benchmark earthquake excitations. The results verify the effectiveness of the proposed current-dependent model and corresponding controller for semi-active control of MRE base isolator incorporated smart structures.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.11 no.6
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• pp.1077-1099
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• 2016

One of the main shortcomings in the current passive base isolation system is lack of adaptability. The recent research and development of a novel adaptive seismic isolator based on magnetorheological elastomer (MRE) material has created an opportunity to add adaptability to base isolation systems for civil structures. The new MRE based base isolator is able to significantly alter its shear modulus or lateral stiffness with the applied magnetic field or electric current, which makes it a competitive candidate to develop an adaptive base isolation system. This paper aims at exploring suitable control algorithms for such adaptive base isolation system by developing a close-loop semi-active control system for a building structure equipped with MRE base isolators. The MRE base isolator is simulated by a numerical model derived from experimental characterization based on the Bouc-Wen Model, which is able to describe the force-displacement response of the device accurately. The parameters of Bouc-Wen Model such as the stiffness and the damping coefficients are described as functions of the applied current. The state-space model is built by analyzing the dynamic property of the structure embedded with MRE base isolators. A Lyapunov-based controller is designed to adaptively vary the current applied to MRE base isolator to suppress the quake-induced vibrations. The proposed control method is applied to a widely used benchmark base-isolated structure by numerical simulation. The performance of the adaptive base isolation system was evaluated through comparison with optimal passive base isolation system and a passive base isolation system with optimized base shear. It is concluded that the adaptive base isolation system with proposed Lyapunov-based semi-active control surpasses the performance of other two passive systems in protecting the civil structures under seismic events.

• Journal of the Korea Concrete Institute
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• v.17 no.6 s.90
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• pp.975-982
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• 2005

Scientific community agrees about the fact that base Isolation provides interesting solutions to minimize the seismic risk. Reliability of such a technique is nowadays proofed by a large number of applications like public buildings, nuclear plants, bridges, etc. This paper reports the results of performance verification tests of the base isolated RC building with the laminated rubber bearings which is manufactured by enterprise in Korea. The shaking table tests were performed using a three story model scaled to 1/3 of the prototype RC apartment building. Several major earthquake records were scaled to different peak ground accelerations and used as input base excitations. Especially in this study, effect of earthquake characteristics on response reduction and effect of the intensity of excitations are studied. Through the verification tests, the validity of the applied base isolaion device and the response reduction effect against earthquakes are confirmed.

• Smart Structures and Systems
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• v.15 no.3
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• pp.847-862
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• 2015

Typical base isolated buildings are designed so that the superstructure remains elastic in design-level earthquakes, though the isolation layer is often quite nonlinear using, e.g., hysteretic elements such as lead-rubber bearings and friction pendulum bearings. Similarly, other well-performing structural control systems keep the structure within the linear range except during the most extreme of excitations. Design optimization of these isolators or other structural control systems requires computationally-expensive response simulations of the (mostly or fully) linear structural system with the nonlinear structural control devices. Standard nonlinear structural analysis algorithms ignore the localized nature of these nonlinearities when computing responses. This paper proposes an approach for the computationally-efficient optimal design of passive isolators by extending a methodology previously developed by the authors for accelerating the response calculation of mostly linear systems with local features (linear or nonlinear, deterministic or random). The methodology is explained and applied to a numerical example of a base isolated building with a hysteretic isolation layer. The computational efficiency of the proposed approach is shown to be significant for this simple problem, and is expected to be even more dramatic for more complex systems.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.48 no.1
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• pp.1-16
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• 2013

The seismic response of RC space frame structures with isolated footing resting on a shallow soil stratum on rock is presented in this paper. Homogeneous soil stratum of different stiffness in the very soft to stiff range is considered. Soil, footing and super structure are considered to be the parts of an integral system. A finite element model of the integrated system is developed and subjected to scaled acceleration time histories recorded during two different real earthquakes. Dynamic analysis is performed using mode superposition method of transient analysis. A parametric study is conducted to investigate the effect of flexibility of soil in the dynamic behaviour of low-rise building frames. The time histories and Fourier spectra of roof displacement, base shear and structural response quantities of the space frame on compliant base are presented and compared with the fixed base condition. Results indicate that the incorporation of soil flexibility is required for the realistic estimate of structural seismic response especially for single storey structures resting on very soft soil.

• Land and Housing Review
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• v.2 no.3
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• pp.287-297
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• 2011

This paper presents the results of performance verification tests of the isolated flat plate apartment building with the laminated rubber bearings. The shaking table test is carried out in CABR(China Academy of Building Research) with two 1/10 scale isolation and non-isolation models under 4 excitation waves. The shaking table test is proceeding from x axis, y axis and x+y axis with different amplitude of acceleration values. The results show that, to non-isolated model, the natural vibration period is remarkably decreased and entered non-linear condition after moderate earthquake. Its accelerations become lager with increasing storey number and completely collapsed under large earthquake. The inter-storey shifts largely exceed the limit values of regulated displacement angles. But to isolated model, the natural vibration period of isolated modal is almost the same in all conditions and still in its elastic condition. The earthquake loading is greatly reduced and the accelerations of superstructure are greatly reduced. The inter-storey drifts are very small and can be neglected. The isolated model is in translational state and can be seen as a rigid whole. The displacements of isolation layer are in the allowable range. This experiment demonstrates that the seismic isolation is very effective to mitigate the influence of earthquake on structures and it is possible to increase the serviceability due to decrease the floor acceleration. facilities from their good states that is superior to non-isolated structure.

• Proceedings of the Earthquake Engineering Society of Korea Conference
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• 2002.09a
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• pp.371-378
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• 2002

The design concepts using vibration reduction techniques, or structural control, have been proposed recently to protect infrastructure against earthquakes. The magnetorheological(MR) fluid damper is one of the most promising new devices for structural vibration reduction because of its mechanical simplicity, high dynamic range, low power requirement, large force capacity and robustness. In this study, the seismic performance of MR devices are compared with that of NZ systems as an attempt to provide some data for improving seismic design techniques applied to structures. For nonlinear time domain analysis of a base isolation system, a six-story building model is considered as a numerical example. The ground acceleration data of El Centre 1940, Mexico City 1985 and Kobe 1995 earthquakes are used as seismic excitations. The results show that MR damper systems for outperform NZ systems in wide-ranging seismic excitations with respect to intensity and period characteristics.

• Proceedings of the KIEE Conference
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• 1997.07b
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• pp.689-692
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• 1997

This paper is attempt to develop an active controller for the vibration of tall civil structures due to earthquake-induced ground acceleration. Various active control methods are applied to an 8 story base isolated system(BIS) with a fumed mass damper(TMD) at the base of the building. The results are also investigated.

• Proceedings of the Earthquake Engineering Society of Korea Conference
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• 2006.03a
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• pp.463-470
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• 2006

이 논문에서는 신경망 제어기와 MR 댐퍼를 이용하여 지진하중을 받는 지진격리 벤치마크 구조물의 응답 감소를 위한 반능동 제어방법이 제안되었다. 제안방법 중 신경망 제어기에는 적절한 제어력을 산출하기 위해 가격함수를 기반으로한 학습 알고리즘과 간편한 민감도 계산기법이 도입되었다. MR 댐퍼가 계산되어진 제어력과 비슷한 제어력을 낼 수 있도록 clipped 알고리즘을 이용하였고, 제안된 반능동 신경망 제어방법이 지진격리 장치가 설치된 벤치마크 구조물에 적용되었다. 수치해석에서는 벤치마크 문제를 정의한 논문에서 제공된 수동제어방법이나 예시제어방법과 제안 방법의 제어성능을 비교하였다. 수치해석 결과 제안방법은 지하 변위를 약간 증가시키지만, 각층의 가속도, base shear, building corner drift 등을 매우 효과적으로 줄이는 것으로 판명되었다.

• Journal of Korean Association for Spatial Structures
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• v.8 no.5
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• pp.75-82
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• 2008

In this study, the possibility of vibration control of high-rise building structures by applying top-story isolation has been investigated. To this end, El Centro NS (1940) earthquake load is applied to 20- and 50-story building structures for numerical analysis. Artificial wind loads are used to evaluate the serviceability of example structures against wind vibration. As the number of isolated stories of example buildings is changed, structural responses has been evaluated to investigate optimal isolated building mass. And the natural period of isolation systems for top-story isolation is varied to investigate the improvement of control performance compared with the fixed base structure. Based on the analytical results, the top-story isolation system can be used as a hued mass damper and effectively reduce the structural responses of high-rise buildings against wind and seismic loads.