Energy-based damage assessment of continuous-span reinforced concrete highway bridges

This paper conducts a comparative study on seismic damage to reinforced concrete(RC)bridges,using three damage models:Park and Ang,Hindi and Sexsmith,and input energy-based damage(IEBD)indices,and presents a global cumulative damage model based on the IEBD index to establish a practical damage assessment of an overall bridge system.A series of RC bridges are studied under seismic loadings,and to compare the efficiency and reliability of the damage indices,damage curves of RC piers are developed,and damage levels of piers are calculated at design basis earthquake(DBE)and maximum considered earthquake(MCE)levels.The global cumulative damage index is calculated for bridge models regarding damage values of components.The results indicate that the IEBD index shows a gradual progression of damage and provides reasonable values for different damage levels of piers compared to two other damage indices.Moreover,the global cumulative damage index shows the impact of induced damage to a certain component regarding the damage level of the overall bridge system.Moreover,this new approach is a relatively simple and practical tool for seismic damage assessment of RC bridge systems,which can be implemented in finite element models,particularly in the absence of experimental data.

Landscape changes have greater effects than climate changes on six insect pests in China

In recent years, global changes are the major causes of frequent, widespread outbreaks of pests in mosaic landscapes, which have received substantial attention worldwide. We collected data on global changes(landscape and climate) and economic damage caused by six main insect pests during 1951–2010 in China. Landscape changes had significant effects on all six insect pests. Pest damage increased significantly with increasing arable land area in agricultural landscapes. However, climate changes had no effect on damage caused by pests, except for the rice leaf roller(Cnaphalocrocis medinalis Guenee) and armyworm(Mythimna separate(Walker)), which caused less damage to crops with increasing mean temperature. Our results indicate that there is slight evidence of possible offset effects of climate changes on the increasing damage from these two agricultural pests. Landscape changes have caused serious outbreaks of several species, which suggests the possibility of the use of landscape design for the control of pest populations through habitat rearrangement. Landscape manipulation may be used as a green method to achieve sustainable pest management with minimal use of insecticides and herbicides.