• Smart Structures and Systems
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• v.14 no.3
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• pp.367-376
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• 2014

Ambient vibration techniques are nowadays a very popular tool to assess dynamic properties of buildings. Due to its non destructive character, this method is particularly valuable, especially for health monitoring of historical monuments. The present ambient vibration experiment consists on the evaluation of vibration modes of a Medieval tower. Situated in Soncino (close to Cremona, in the Northern Italian region named Lombardia), the tower of 41.5 meters height has been monitored by seismometers located at different points inside the structure. Spectral ratios of the recorded ambient vibrations clearly identify a fundamental mode at about 1 Hz, with a slight difference in the two horizontal components. A second mode is also evidenced at approx 4-5 Hz, with a moderate degree of uncertainty. The records of a ML 4.4 earthquake, occurred during the monitoring period, confirm the information obtained by microtremor analysis. Daily variations of both 1st and 2nd mode were detected: these variations, of an amount up to 2%, seem to be well related with the temperature.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.29 no.6
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• pp.623-642
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• 2008

While spatial plastic mechanism analysis has been widely and successfully applied to thinwalled steel structures to analyse the post-failure behaviour of sections and connections, there remains some contention in the literature as to the basic capacity of an inclined yield line. The simple inclined hinge commonly forms as part of the more complex spatial mechanism, which may involve a number of hinges perpendicular or inclined to the direction of thrust. In this paper some of the existing theories are compared with single inclined yield lines that form in flange outstands, by comparing the theories with plate tests of plates simply supported on three sides with the remaining (longitudinal) edge free. The existing mechanism theories do not account for different in-plane displacement gradients of the loaded edge, nor the slenderness of the plates, and produce conservative results. A modified theory is presented whereby uniform and non-uniform in-plane displacements of the loaded edge of the flange, and the slenderness of the flange, are accounted for. The modified theory is shown to compare well with the plate test data, and its application to flanges that are components of sections in compression and/or bending is presented.

• Proceedings of the Earthquake Engineering Society of Korea Conference
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• 2001.09a
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• pp.276-283
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• 2001

Performance-based design concepts require the next generation of codes. To implement the main concepts several design methodologies have been proposed. This paper reviews the framework of Korea Seismic Code and shows necessary modification for adoption of appropriate design methods. The selection of design earthquake levels with the introduction of risk factor is discussed for proper risk levels for all earthquake hazards. Displacement-based design, energy-based design, comprehensive design, and force-strength design methods are reviewed as one of possible next generation design methods. This paper proposes the direction of reconstruction for design earthquake levels with performance matrix, introduction of new design methods, and emphasis on non- structural components.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.14 no.4
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• pp.783-788
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• 2004

Marker proteins of genetically-modified organisms (GMO) and their antibodies were prepared and characterized as major components of an analytical system. We selected two GMO markers, neomycin phosphotransferase II and 5- enolpyruvylshikimate-3-phosphate synthase, and produced them from E. coli employing genetic recombination technology. After purification, their structural conformation and binding affinities to the respective antibodies were characterized. The results showed that the recombinant proteins were identical with commercially obtained reference proteins. We further used them as immunogens to raise polyclonal antibodies capable of discriminating GMO containing protein from non-GMO. Well-characterized marker proteins and antibodies will be valuable as immunoreagents in constructing analytical systems such as biosensors and biochips to measure quantities of GMO.

• Journal of Korean Association for Spatial Structures
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• v.1 no.1 s.1
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• pp.109-115
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• 2001

Composite materials also known as fiber reinforced plastics have been developed and used in many engineering applications due to their outstanding mechanical properties. Laminated plates as structural components that are made of in composite material are widely used. Therefore, nonlinear response of laminated composite plates modeled with finite elements and excited by stochastic loading is studied. The classical laminated plate theory is used to account for the variation of strains through the thickness for modeling laminated thin plates. Approximate nonlinear random vibration analysis is performed using the method of equivalent linearization to account for material non-linearity.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.22 no.5
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• pp.613-629
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• 2006

In this paper a recently developed scaled boundary finite element method (SBFEM) is applied to simulate stress concentration for two-dimensional structures. In addition, a simple and independent formulation for evaluating the coefficients, not only of the singular term but also higher order non-singular terms, of the stress fields near crack-tip is presented. The formulation is formed by comparing the displacement along the radial points ahead of the crack-tip with that of standard Williams' eigenfunction solution for the crack-tip. The validity of the formulation is examined by numerical examples with different geometries for a range of crack sizes. The results show good agreement with available solutions in literatures. Based on the results of the study, it is conformed that the proposed numerical method can be applied to simulate stress concentrations in both cracked and uncracked structure components more easily with relatively coarse and simple model than other computational methods.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.55 no.1
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• pp.29-46
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• 2015

A three-dimensional (3-D) method of analysis is presented for determining the natural frequencies of a truncated shallow and deep conical shell with linearly varying thickness along the meridional direction free at its top edge and clamped at its bottom edge. Unlike conventional shell theories, which are mathematically two-dimensional (2-D), the present method is based upon the 3-D dynamic equations of elasticity. Displacement components $u_r$, $u_{\theta}$, and $u_z$ in the radial, circumferential, and axial directions, respectively, are taken to be periodic in ${\theta}$ and in time, and algebraic polynomials in the r and z directions. Strain and kinetic energies of the truncated conical shell with variable thickness are formulated, and the Ritz method is used to solve the eigenvalue problem, thus yielding upper bound values of the frequencies by minimizing the frequencies. As the degree of the polynomials is increased, frequencies converge to the exact values. Convergence to four-digit exactitude is demonstrated. The frequencies from the present 3-D method are compared with those from other 3-D finite element method and 2-D shell theories.

• Journal of Applied Reliability
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• v.3 no.1
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• pp.1-12
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• 2003

A continuum structure function(CSF) is a non-decreasing mapping from the unit hypercube to the unit interval. A Barlow-Wu type CSF is a CSF whose behaviour is modeled by its underlying binary structure, which is based on the multistate structure functions suggested by Barlow and Wu(1978). As the measures of importance of a system component for a Barlow-Wu type CSF, the structural and reliability importance of a component at system level ${\alpha}$ (0< ${\alpha}$ <1) are defined and their properties are deduced. Computational results are discussed as well for illustrative purpose.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.7 no.6
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• pp.575-588
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• 1999

A boundary element method is applied to the analysis of crack trajectory in materials with complex microstructure, such as discontinuously reinforced composite materials, and systems subjected to complex loading, such as indentation. The path followed by the crack(s) has non-trivial geometry. A study of the stress intensity factors and fracture toughness of such systems must therefore be accompanied by an analysis of crack trajectory. The simulation is achieved using a dual boundary integral method in planar problems, and a single boundary integral method coupled with substructuring in axisymmetric problems. The direction of crack propagation is determined using the maximum mechanical energy release rate criterion. The method is demonstrated by application to (i) a composite material composed of components having the elastic properties of aluminium (matrix) and silicon carbide (reinforcement), and (ii) analysis of contact damage induced by the action of an indenter on brittle materials. The chief advantage of the method is the ease with which problems having complex geometry or loading (giving rise to complex crack trajectories) can be treated.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.54 no.4
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• pp.1167-1174
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• 2022

Cast austenitic stainless steels (CASSs) are widely used as structural materials in the nuclear industry. The main drawback of CASSs is the reduction in fracture toughness due to long-term exposure to operating environment. Even though ultrasonic non-destructive testing has been conducted in major nuclear components and pipes, the detection of cracks is difficult due to the scattering and attenuation of ultrasonic waves by the coarse grains and the inhomogeneity of CASS materials. In this study, the ultrasonic signals measured in thermally aged CASS were discriminated for the first time with the simple ultrasonic technique (UT) and machine learning (ML) models. Several different ML models, specifically the K-nearest neighbors (KNN), Support Vector Machine (SVM), and Multi-Layer Perceptron (MLP) models, were used to classify the ultrasonic signals as thermal aging condition of CASS specimens. We identified that the ML models can predict the category of ultrasonic signals effectively according to the aging condition.