• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.69 no.3
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• pp.293-306
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• 2019

In current seismic design codes, various elastic design acceleration spectra are defined considering different seismological and soil characteristics and are widely used tool for calculation of seismic loads acting on structures. Response spectrum analyses directly use the elastic design acceleration spectra whereas time history analyses use acceleration records of earthquakes whose acceleration spectra fit the design spectra of seismic codes. Due to the fact that obtaining coherent structural response quantities with the seismic design code considerations is a desired circumstance in dynamic analyses, the response spectra of earthquake records used in time history analyses had better fit to the design acceleration spectra of seismic codes. This paper evaluates structural response distributions of multi-story reinforced concrete frames obtained from nonlinear time history analyses which are performed by using the scaled earthquake records compatible with various elastic design spectra. Time domain scaling procedure is used while processing the response spectrum of real accelerograms to fit the design acceleration spectra. The elastic acceleration design spectra of Turkish Seismic Design Code 2007, Uniform Building Code 1997 and Eurocode 8 are considered as target spectra in the scaling procedure. Soil classes in different seismic codes are appropriately matched up with each other according to $V_{S30}$ values. The maximum roof displacements and the total base shears of considered frame structures are determined from nonlinear time history analyses using the scaled earthquake records and the results are presented by graphs and tables. Coherent structural response quantities reflecting the influence of elastic design spectra of various seismic codes are obtained.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.87 no.5
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• pp.405-418
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• 2023

This study focused on the effectiveness of seismic isolation technique in case of a reinforced concrete structure with soft story defined as the stiffness irregularity between adjacent stories. In this context, a seismically isolated 3-story reinforced concrete structure was analyzed by gradually increasing the first story height (3.0, 4.5, and 6.0 m). The seismic isolation system of the structure is assumed to be composed of lead rubber bearings (LRB). In the analyses, isolators were modeled by both deteriorating (temperature-dependent analyses) and non-deteriorating (bounding analyses) hysteretic representations. The deterioration in strength of isolator is due to temperature rise in the lead core during cyclic motion. The ground motion pairs used in bi-directional nonlinear dynamic analyses were selected and scaled according to codified procedures. In the analyses, different isolation periods (Tiso) and characteristic strength to weight ratios (Q/W) were considered in order to determine the sensitivity of structural response to the isolator properties. Response quantities under consideration are floor accelerations, and interstory drift ratios. Analyses results are compared for both hysteretic representations of LRBs. Results are also used to assess the significance of the ratio between the horizontal stiffnesses of soft story and isolation system. It is revealed that seismic isolation is a viable method to reduce structural damage in structures with soft story.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.14 no.5
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• pp.389-398
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• 2018

The seismic isolation system makes a structure isolated from ground motions to protect the structure from seismic events. Seismic isolation techniques have been implemented in full-scale buildings and bridges because of their simplicity, economic effectiveness, inherent stability and reliability. As for the responses of an isolated structure due to seismic events, it is well known that the most uncertain aspects are the seismic loading itself and structural properties. Due to the randomness of earthquakes and uncertainty of structures, seismic response distributions of an isolated structure are needed when evaluating the seismic fragility assessment (or probabilistic seismic safety assessment) of an isolated structure. Seismic response time histories are useful and often essential elements in its design or evaluation stage. Thus, a large number of non-linear dynamic analyses should be performed to evaluate the seismic performance of an isolated structure. However, it is a monumental task to gather the design or evaluation information of the isolated structure from too many seismic analyses, which is impractical. In this paper, a new methodology that can evaluate the seismic fragility assessment of an isolated structure is proposed by using stochastic response database, which is a device that can estimate the seismic response distributions of an isolated structure without any seismic response analyses. The seismic fragility assessment of the isolated nuclear power plant is performed using the proposed methodology. The proposed methodology is able to evaluate the seismic performance of isolated structures effectively and reduce the computational efforts tremendously.

• Proceedings of the Earthquake Engineering Society of Korea Conference
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• 2000.10a
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• pp.167-175
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• 2000

Seismic analyses of structures can`t be performed without considering the effect of soil-structure interaction and seismic responses of a structure taking into account the stiffnesses of a foundation-soil system show a significant difference from those with a rigid base. However, current seismic analyses of apartment building structures were carried out assuming a rigid base and ignoring the characteristics of a foundation and the properties of the underlying soil. In this study, seismic analyses of apartment buildings of a particular wall-slab structural type were carried out comparing seismic response spectra of a flexible base with those of a rigid base and UBC-97. Wall-slab type low-rise or mid-height apartment buildings built on the deep soil layer showed a rigid body motion with the reduced seismic responses due to the base isolation effect, indicating that it is too safe but uneconomical to utilize the design spectra of UBC-97 for the seismic analysis of a wall-slab type apartment buildings due to the too conservative design.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.51 no.2
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• pp.600-606
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• 2019

Studies on the application of the lead rubber bearing (LRB) isolation system to nuclear power plants are being carried out as one of the measures to improve seismic performance. Nuclear power plants with isolation systems require seismic probabilistic safety assessments, for which the seismic fragility of the structures, systems, and components needs be calculated, including for beyond design basis earthquakes. To this end, seismic response analyses are required, where it can be seen that the behaviors of the isolation system components govern the overall seismic response of an isolated plant. The numerical model of the LRB used in these seismic response analyses plays an important role, but in most cases, the extreme performance of the LRB has not been well studied. The current work therefore develops an extreme nonlinear numerical model that can express the seismic response of the LRB for beyond design basis earthquakes. A full-scale LRB was fabricated and dynamically tested with various input conditions, and test results confirmed that the developed numerical model better represents the behavior of the LRB over previous models. Subsequent seismic response analyses of isolated nuclear power plants using the model developed here are expected to provide more accurate results for seismic probabilistic safety assessments.

• Journal of the Earthquake Engineering Society of Korea
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• v.21 no.1
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• pp.69-76
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• 2017

Seismic analyses of a pile under a large rigid basement foundation embedded in the homogeneous soil layer were performed practically by a response displacement method assuming a sinusoidal wave form. However, it is hard to take into account the characteristics of a large mat foundation and a heterogeneous soil layer with the response displacement method. The response displacement method is relevant to the 2D problems for longitudinal structures such as tunnel, underground cave structure, etc., but might not be relevant with isolated foundations for building structures. In this study, seismic pile analysis by a pseudo 3D finite element method was carried out to compare numerical results with results of the response displacement method considering 3D characteristics of a foundation-soil system which is important for the building foundation analyses. Study results show that seismic analyses results of a response displacement method are similar to those of a pseudo 3D numerical method for stiff and dense soil layers, but they are too conservative for a soft soil layer inducing large soil pressures on the foundation wall and large pile displacements due to ignored foundation rigidity and resistance.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.23 no.4
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• pp.385-401
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• 2022

Uncertainty quantification is the most important challenge in seismic fragility assessment of structures. The precision increment of the quantification method leads to reliable results but at the same time increases the computational costs and the latter will be so undesirable in cases such as reliability-based design optimization which includes numerous probabilistic seismic analyses. Accordingly, the authors' effort has been put on the development and validation of an approach that has reduced computational cost in seismic fragility assessment. In this regard, it is necessary to apply the appropriate methods for consideration of two categories of uncertainties consisting of uncertainties related to the ground motions and structural characteristics, separately. Also, cable-stayed bridges have been specifically selected because as a result of their complexity and the according time-consuming seismic analyses, reducing the computations corresponding to their fragility analyses is worthy of studying. To achieve this, the fragility assessment of three case studies is performed based on existing and proposed approaches, and a comparative study on the efficiency in the estimation of seismic responses. For this purpose, statistical validation is conducted on the seismic demand and fragility resulting from the mentioned approaches, and through a comprehensive interpretation, sufficient arguments for the acceptable errors of the proposed approach are presented. Finally, this study concludes that the combination of the Capacity Spectrum Method (CSM) and Uniform Design Sampling (UDS) in advanced proposed forms can provide adequate accuracy in seismic fragility estimation at a significantly reduced computational cost.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.10 no.6
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• pp.1347-1367
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• 2016

The purpose of this work is to investigate the seismic behavior of St. Titus Church in Heraklion, Crete, Greece as well as the need of its seismic retrofitting. A numerical model of the Church is constructed using shell finite elements and it is then seismically examined using response spectrum and linear time-history analyses. Effects of soil-structure interaction have been also taken into account. The Church without retrofit is expected to exhibit extensive tensile failures and many compressive ones. Aiming to maintain the architectural character of the structure as well as to increase its seismic resistance, a retrofitting procedure involving injection of cement grout in conjunction with reinforced concrete jacketing to the internal side of the masonry walls is proposed. A numerical implementation of the proposed seismic retrofitting is performed and its effect is evaluated by response spectrum and linear time-history analyses. From the results of these analyses, it is shown that compressive failures are eliminated while only few tensile failures of local character take place.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.16 no.2
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• pp.221-234
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• 2019

Today, many important concrete face rockfill dams (CFRDs) have been built on the world, and some of these important structures are located on the strong seismic regions. In this reason, examination and monitoring of these water construction's seismic behaviour is very important for the safety and future of these dams. In this study, the nonlinear seismic behaviour of Ilısu CFR dam which was built in Turkey in 2017, is investigated for various reservoir water heights taking into account 1995 Kobe near-fault and far-fault ground motions. Three dimensional (3D) finite difference model of the dam is created using the FLAC3D software that is based on the finite difference method. The most suitable mesh range for the 3D model is chosen to achieve the realistic numerical results. Mohr-Coulomb nonlinear material model is used for the rockfill materials and foundation in the seismic analyses. Moreover, Drucker-Prager nonlinear material model is considered for the concrete slab to represent the nonlinearity of the concrete. The dam body, foundation and concrete slab constantly interact during the lifetime of the CFRDs. Therefore, the special interface elements are defined between the dam body-concrete slab and dam body-foundation due to represent the interaction condition in the 3D model. Free field boundary condition that was used rarely for the nonlinear seismic analyses, is considered for the lateral boundaries of the model. In addition, quiet artificial boundary condition that is special boundary condition for the rigid foundation in the earthquake analyses, is used for the bottom of the foundation. The hysteric damping coefficients are separately calculated for all of the materials. These special damping values is defined to the FLAC3D software using the special fish functions to capture the effects of the variation of the modulus and damping ratio with the dynamic shear-strain magnitude. Total 4 different reservoir water heights are taken into account in the seismic analyses. These water heights are empty reservoir, 50 m, 100 m and 130 m (full reservoir), respectively. In the nonlinear seismic analyses, near-fault and far-fault ground motions of 1995 Kobe earthquake are used. According to the numerical analyses, horizontal displacements, vertical displacements and principal stresses for 4 various reservoir water heights are evaluated in detail. Moreover, these results are compared for the near-fault and far-faults earthquakes. The nonlinear seismic analysis results indicate that as the reservoir height increases, the nonlinear seismic behaviour of the dam clearly changes. Each water height has different seismic effects on the earthquake behaviour of Ilısu CFR dam. In addition, it is obviously seen that near-fault earthquakes and far field earthquakes create different nonlinear seismic damages on the nonlinear earthquake behaviour of the dam.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.83 no.2
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• pp.207-227
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• 2022

In general, the interaction conditions between the discrete stones are not taken into account by structural engineers during the modeling and analyzing of historical stone bridges. However, many structural damages in the stone bridges occur due to ignoring the interaction conditions between discrete stones. In this study, it is aimed to examine the seismic behavior of a historical stone bridge by considering the interaction stiffness parameters between stone elements. For this purpose, Tokatli historical stone arch bridge was built in 1179 in Karabük-Turkey, is chosen for three-dimensional (3D) seismic analyses. Firstly, the 3D finite-difference model of the Tokatli stone bridge is created using the FLAC3D software. During the modeling processes, the Burger-Creep material model which was not used to examine the seismic behavior of historical stone bridges in the past is utilized. Furthermore, the free-field and quiet non-reflecting boundary conditions are defined to the lateral and bottom boundaries of the bridge. Thanks to these boundary conditions, earthquake waves do not reflect in the 3D model. After each stone element is modeled separately, stiffness elements are defined between the stone elements. Three situations of the stiffness elements are considered in the seismic analyses; a) for only normal direction b) for only shear direction c) for both normal and shear directions. The earthquake analyses of the bridge are performed for these three different situations of the bridge. The far-fault and near-fault conditions of 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake are taken into account during the earthquake analyses. According to the seismic analysis results, the directions of the stiffness parameters seriously changed the earthquake behavior of the Tokatli bridge. Moreover, the most critical stiffness parameter is determined for seismic analyses of historical stone arch bridges.