Quantitative investigation on collapse margin of steel high-rise buildings subjected to extremely severe earthquakes

Reponses of structures subjected to severe earthquakes sometimes significantly surpass what was considered in the design.It is important to investigate the failure mechanism and collapse margin of structures beyond design,especially for high-rise buildings.In this study,steel high-rise buildings using either square concrete-filled-tube（CFT） columns or steel tube columns are designed.A detailed three-dimensional（3 D） structural model is developed to analyze the seismic behavior of a steel high-rise towards a complete collapse.The effectiveness is verified by both component tests and a full-scale shaking table test.The collapse margin,which is defined as the ratio of PGA between the collapse level to the design major earthquake level（Level 2）,is quantified by a series of numerical simulations using incremental dynamic analyses（IDA）.The baseline building using CFT columns collapsed with a weak first story mechanism and presented a collapse margin ranging from 10 to 20.The significant variation in the collapse margin was caused by the different characteristics of the input ground motions.The building using equivalent steel columns collapsed earlier due to the significant shortening of the locally buckled columns,exhibiting only 57% of the collapse margin of the baseline building.The influence of reducing the height of the first story was quite significant.The shortened first story not only enlarged the collapse margin by 20%,but also changed the collapse mode.

Earthquake engineering research needs in light of lessons learned from the 2011 Tohoku earthquake

Earthquake engineering research and development have received much attention since the first half of the twentieth century. This valuable research presented a huge step forward in understanding earthquake hazard mitigation,which resulted in appreciable reduction of the effects of past earthquakes. Nevertheless,the 2011 Tohoku earthquake and the subsequent tsunami resulted in major damage. This paper presents the timeline of earthquake mitigation and recovery,as seen by the authors. Possible research directions where the authors think that many open questions still remain are identified. These are primarily based on the important lessons learned from the 2011 Tohoku earthquake.

Flexible substructure online hybrid test system using conventional testing devices

This paper presents a substructure online hybrid test system that is extensible for geographically distributed tests. This system consists of a set of devices conventionally used for cyclic tests to load the tested substructures onto the target displacement or the target force. Due to their robustness and portability, individual sets of conventional loading devices can be transported and reconfigured to realize physical loading in geographically remote laboratories. Another appealing feature is the flexible displacement-force mixed control that is particularly suitable for specimens having large disparities in stiffness during various performance stages. To conduct a substructure online hybrid test, an extensible framework is developed, which is equipped with a generalized interface to encapsulate each substructure. Multiple tested substructures and analyzed substructures using various structural program codes can be accommodated within the single framework, simply interfaced with the boundary displacements and forces. A coordinator program is developed to keep the boundaries among all substructures compatible and equilibrated. An Interuet-based data exchange scheme is also devised to transfer data among computers equipped with different software environments. A series of online hybrid tests are introduced, and the portability, flexibility, and extensibility of the online hybrid test system are demonstrated.

Application of headed studs in steel fiber reinforced cementitious composite slab of steel beam-column connection

Steel fiber reinforced cementitous composites （SFRCC） is a promising material with high strength in both compression and tension compared with normal concrete. The ductility is also greatly improved because of 6% volume portion of straight steel fibers. A steel beam-column connection with Steel fiber reinforced cementitous composites （SFRCC） slab diaphragms is proposed to overcome the damage caused by the weld. The push-out test results suggested that the application of SFRCC promises larger shear forces transferred through headed studs allocated in a small area in the slab. Finite element models were developed to simulate the behavior of headed studs. The failure mechanism of the grouped arrangement is fiarther discussed based on a series of parametric analysis. In the proposed connection, the SFRCC slab is designed as an exterior diaphragm to transfer the beam flange load to the column face. The headed studs are densely arranged on the beam flange to connect the SFRCC slab diaphragms and steel beams. The seismic performance and failure mechanism of the SFRCC slab diaphragm beam-column connection were investigated based on the cyclic loading test. Beam hinge mechanism was achieved at the end of the SFRCC slab diaphragm by using sufficient studs and appropriate rebars in the SFRCC slab.

H_(∞)control in the frequency domain for a semi-active floor isolation system

A floor isolation system installed in a single floor or room in a fixed base structure is designed to protect equipment.With this configuration,the input motions to the floor isolation from the ground motions are filtered by the structure,leaving the majority of the frequency content of the input motion lower than the predominant frequency of the structure.The floor isolation system should minimize the acceleration to protect equipment;however,displacement must also be limited to save floor space,especially with long period motion.Semi-active control with an H_(∞)control was adopted for the floor isolation system and a new input shaping filter was developed to account for the input motion characteristics and enhance the effectiveness of the H_(∞)control.A series of shake table tests for a semi-active floor isolation system using rolling pendulum isolators and a magnetic-rheological damper were performed to validate the H_(∞)control.Passive control using an oil damper was also tested for comparison.The test results show that the H_(∞)control effectively reduced acceleration for short period motions with frequencies close to the predominant frequency of the structure,as well as effectively reduced displacement for long period motions with frequencies close to the natural frequency of the floor isolation system.The H_(∞)control algorithm proved to be more advantageous than passive control because of its capacity to adjust control strategies according to the different motion frequency characteristics.