Analysis of Stress Concentration Factors due to in-Plane Bending and out-of-Plane Bending Loads on Tubular TY-Joints of Offshore Structures

The aim of this work is to study the stress distributions and the location of hot spots stress in the vicinity of the intersection lines of the tubular elements of the tubular TY-joints.Using the finite element models,we analyze the effects of geometrical parameters on the stress concentration factor in the case of in-plane bending and out-of-plane bending loads,around the weld toe of the tubular joints.Our results reveal the location of the maximum stress concentration factor at the heel or toe in the case of in-plane bending loads and at the saddle point in the case of out-of-plane bending loads.Six parametric equations are established and used to calculate the stress concentration factor at critical locations using the non-linear regression method.The results obtained from the finite element analysis are close to the results of the parametric equations and the experimental data from the previous work.

In-Plane Elastic Stability of Arches under a Radial Concentrated Load

This paper is concerned with the in-plane elastic stability of arches subjected to a radial concentrated load. The equilibrium equation for pin-ended circular arches is established by using energy method, and it is proved that the axial force is nearly a constant along the circumference of the circular arches. Based on force method, the equation for the primary eigen function is derived and solved, and the approximate analytical solution of critical instability load is obtained. Numerical examples are given and discussed.

Tangling and instability effect analysis of initial in-plane/out-of-plane angles on electrodynamic tether deployment under gravity gradient

The space debris occupies the orbit resources greatly,which seriously threats the safety of spacecraft for its high risks of collisions.Many theories about space debris removal have been put forward in recent years.The Electro Dynamic Tether(EDT),which can be deployed under gravity gradient,is considered to be an effective method to remove debris in low orbit for its low power consumption.However,in order to generate sufficient Lorentz force,the EDT needs to be deployed to several kilometers,which increases the risks of tangling and the instability of the EDT system.In the deployment process,different initial in-plane/out-of-plane angles,caused by direction error at initial release or the initial selection of ejection,affect the motion of EDT system seriously.In order to solve these problems,firstly,this paper establishes the dynamic model of the EDT system.Then,based on the model,safety metrics of avoiding tangling and assessing system stability during EDT deployment stage are designed to quantitatively evaluate the EDT system security.Finally,several numerical simulations are established to determine the safety ranges of the initial in-plane/out-of-plane angles on the EDT deployment.

Variation of Out-of-Plane Constraint and Its Effects on Fracture

The limitations of using one-parameter to describe the crack-tip fields have prompted investigators to consider better descriptions of the crack tip fields. The two-parameter descriptions, such as J-Q theory, have been an important development in this field. But under the consideration of plane strain and three-dimensional problem, the effects of the out-of-plane stress can not be neglected In this paper, effects of the in-plane constraint as well as the out-of-plane constraint are studied by aid of the finite element method on the plane strain condition. It is obvious that both the in-plane constraint (Q factor) and the out-of-plane constraint (Tz = σzz/(σxx + σyy) ) affect the crack tip fields.Several important features of the out-of-plane constraint are described out based on the simulation results. At the end of this paper, a three-parameter formulation is proposed, in which both the in-plane constraint and the out-of-plane constraint are considered. Comparing with the results of the FEM numerical simulation, the three-parameter description can provide a better prediction near the crack tip.

Vision-based fatigue crack detection using global motion compensation and video feature tracking

Fatigue cracks that develop in civil infrastructure such as steel bridges due to repetitive loads pose a major threat to structural integrity.Despite being the most common practice for fatigue crack detection,human visual inspection is known to be labor intensive,time-consuming,and prone to error.In this study,a computer vision-based fatigue crack detection approach using a short video recorded under live loads by a moving consumer-grade camera is presented.The method detects fatigue crack by tracking surface motion and identifies the differential motion pattern caused by opening and closing of the fatigue crack.However,the global motion introduced by a moving camera in the recorded video is typically far greater than the actual motion associated with fatigue crack opening/closing,leading to false detection results.To overcome the challenge,global motion compensation(GMC)techniques are introduced to compensate for camera-induced movement.In particular,hierarchical model-based motion estimation is adopted for 2D videos with simple geometry and a new method is developed by extending the bundled camera paths approach for 3D videos with complex geometry.The proposed methodology is validated using two laboratory test setups for both in-plane and out-of-plane fatigue cracks.The results confirm the importance of motion compensation for both 2D and 3D videos and demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed GMC methods as well as the subsequent crack detection algorithm.

Performance of masonry enclosure walls:lessons learned from recent earthquakes

This paper discusses the issue of performance requirements and construction criteria for masonry enclosure and infill walls. Vertical building enclosures in European countries are very often constituted by non-load-bearing masonry walls, using horizontally perforated clay bricks. These walls are generally supported and confined by a reinforced concrete frame structure of columns and beams/slabs. Since these walls are commonly considered to be nonstructural elements and their influence on the structural response is ignored, their consideration in the design of structures as well as their connection to the adjacent structural elements is frequently negligent or insufficiently detailed. As a consequence, nonstructural elements, as for wall enclosures, are relatively sensitive to drift and acceleration demands when buildings are subjected to seismic actions. Many international standards and technical documents stress the need for design acceptability criteria for nonstructural elements, however they do not specifically indicate how to prevent collapse and severe cracking, and how to enhance the overall stability in the case of moderate to high seismic loading. Furthermore, a review of appropriate measures to improve enclosure wall performance and both in-plane and out-of-plane integrity under seismic actions is addressed.

Hydrodynamic Analysis of Elastic Floating Collars in Random Waves

As the main load-bearing component of fish cages, the floating collar supports the whole cage and undergoes large deformations. In this paper, a mathematical method is developed to study the motions and elastic deformations of elastic floating collars in random waves. The irregular wave is simulated by the random phase method and the statistical approach and Fourier transfer are applied to analyze the elastic response in both time and frequency domains. The governing equations of motions are established by Newton＇s second law, and the governing equations of deformations are obtained based on curved beam theory and modal superposition method. In order to validate the numerical model of the floating collar attacked by random waves, a series of physical model tests are conducted. Good relationship between numerical simulation and experimental observations is obtained. The numerical results indicate that the transfer function of out-of-plane and in-plane deformations increase with the increasing of wave frequency. In the frequency range between 0.6 Hz and 1.1 Hz, a linear relationship exists between the wave elevations and the deformations. The average phase difference between the wave elevation and out-of-plane deformation is 60° with waves leading and the phase between the wave elevation and in-plane deformation is 10° with waves lagging. In addition, the effect of fish net on the elastic response is analyzed. The results suggest that the deformation of the floating collar with fish net is a little larger than that without net.

CONSTRAINTS ON THE CRACK TIP PLASTIC FIELDS UNDER LARGE SCALE YIELD

Plane strain elastic-plastic finite element analyses are used tostudy the stress, strain fields around a straight crack in powerhardening plastic material. Center crack panel (CCP), single edgecrack panel (SECP) and double edge crack panel (DECP) tensionspecimens are analyzed with various crack lengths. Two localconstraint parameters, i.e. in-plane stress ratio T_x andout-of-plane constraint T_z are an- alyzed, which are defined astangential stress dividing normal (open) stress and out-of-planestress dividing the sum of tangential stress and normal stressrespectively.

Dual-logic-in-memory implementation with orthogonal polarization of van der Waals ferroelectric heterostructure

The rapid advancement of AI-enabled applications has resulted in an increasing need for energy-efficient computing hardware.Logic-in-memory is a promising approach for processing the data stored in memory,wherein fast and efficient computations are possible owing to the parallel execution of reconfigurable logic operations.In this study,a dual-logic-in-memory device,which can simultaneously perform two logic operations in four states,is demonstrated using van der Waals ferroelectric field-effect transistors(vdW FeFETs).The proposed dual-logic-in-memory device,which also acts as a twobit storage device,is a single bidirectional polarization-integrated ferroelectric field-effect transistor(BPI-FeFET).It is fabricated by integrating an in-plane vdW ferroelectric semiconductor SnS and an out-of-plane vdW ferroelectric gate dielectric material—CuInP_(2)S_(6).Four reliable resistance states with excellent endurance and retention characteristics were achieved.The two-bit storage mechanism in a BPI-FeFET was analyzed from two perspectives:carrier density and carrier injection controls,which originated from the out-of-plane polarization of the gate dielectric and in-plane polarization of the semiconductor,respectively.Unlike conventional multilevel FeFETs,the proposed BPIFeFET does not require additional pre-examination or erasing steps to switch from/to an intermediate polarization,enabling direct switching between the four memory states.To utilize the fabricated BPI-FeFET as a dual-logic-inmemory device,two logical operations were selected(XOR and AND),and their parallel execution was demonstrated.Different types of logic operations could be implemented by selecting different initial states,demonstrating various types of functions required for numerous neural network operations.The flexibility and efficiency of the proposed dual-logic-in-memory device appear promising in the realization of next-generation low-power computing systems.

Seismic assessment of RC frames infilled with innovative CFS walls considering seismic orientation effect

The metal tailings porous concrete cold-formed steel(MCFS)wall is an innovative cold-formed steel(CFS)wall with good thermal and mechanical properties,which has the potential to be widely utilized as the infilled wall(IW).In this paper,the MCFS walls are adopted in the reinforced concrete(RC)frame,and the seismic performance of the building subjected to ground motions with various incidence angles are investigated.Three-dimensional finite element model of the studied building is developed with full consideration of the in-plain(IP)and out-of-plane(OP)behavior of MCFS walls.Incremental dynamic analysis is conducted to obtain the deformation responses of frames and damage ratios of MCFS walls under the combined effect of seismic intensity and orientation.Fragility curves are generated to assess the seismic performance of the building and investigate the effect of ground motion orientation.The results validate the superior performance of infilled MCFS walls,and reveal that the seismic orientation has a considerable impact on the response along each reference axis of the structure.Furthermore,different incidence angles induce up to 10.2%and 14.4%variations in the median Sa(T1)of fragilities for the frames in X and Y axes,and the corresponding change rates in the median Sa(T1)for the walls are 13.5%and 15.1%,respectively.However,for the overall performance of the building,the seismic orientation effect is less significant.The rates of changes in median Sa(T1)are less than 4%for both frames and MCFS walls.

Trace initial interaction from final state observable in relativistic heavy ion collisions

In order to trace azimuthal angle dependence of the initial interaction in ultra-relativistic heavy ion collision, two azimuthal multiplicity-correlation patterns neighboring and fixed-to-arbitrary angularbin correlation patterns -- are suggested. From the simulation of Au ＋ Au collisions at √SNN = 200 GeV by using the Monte Carlo models RQMD with hadron re-scattering and AMPT with and without string melting, we observe that the correlation patterns change gradually from out-of-plane preferential one to inplane preferential one when the centrality of collision shifts from the central collision to peripheral collision, meanwhile the anisotropic collective flow v2 keeps positive in all cases. This regularity is found to be collision energy independent. The physics behind the two opposite trends of correlation patterns, in particular, the presence of out-of-plane correlation patterns at RHIC energy, are discussed.

Enhanced design of hourglass truss sandwich structures for compressive resistance

In this article,the design of the hourglass truss sandwich structure is improved by optimizing the number of layers to enhance the compressive strength of both the core and the face sheet and then its mechanical performance. The hourglass truss structures characterized by three different numbers of layers are manufactured using an interlocking and vacuum brazing method. The effect of the layer number of the hourglass core panels on their out-of-plane compression and in-plane compression performance is investigated,and the results from calculations and experiments are in reasonable agreement. The results show that as the layer number of the hourglass core increases,the out-of-plane compressive strengths show little change,but their energy absorption properties are effectively increased. The in-plane compressive failure mechanism maps are constructed,and the specimens are designed to examine the local elastic and inelastic buckling failure modes of the face sheets. The results suggest that as the number of layers of the hourglass core increases,its maximum in-plane compressive load increases. The maximum in-plane compressive loads of the two-layer hourglass truss panels are 57%–70% higher than those of the single-layer panels. It can also be concluded that the out-of-plane and in-plane compression mechanical properties of the multilayer hourglass truss outperform those of the pyramidal truss. Furthermore,the number of layers of the hourglass core is optimized in consideration of both mechanical properties and fabrication cost.

Seismic safety evaluation methodology for masonry building and retrofitting using splint and bandage technique with wire mesh

The paper presents a seismic safety assessment of unreinforced masonry(URM)building using two approaches.The first approach uses the‘Pier Analysis’method,based on the concept of equivalent lateral stiffness,where in-plane and out-of-plane actions are considered independently.The second approach is developed with the program SAP2000,where the linear response is evaluated using continuum‘finite element modelling’(FEM).Both methods are compared to evaluate the safety of wall piers and the differences in the outcomes under combined gravitational and lateral seismic forces.The analysis results showed that few wall elements are unsafe in in-plane and out-of-plane tension.It is also observed that the pier analysis method is conservative compared to FEM,but can be used as a simplified and quick tool in design offices for safety assessment,with reasonable accuracy.To safeguard the URM wall piers under lateral loads,a retrofitting technique is adopted by providing vertical and horizontal belts called splints and bandages,respectively,using welded wire mesh(WWM)reinforcement.The study using the‘Pier Analysis’shows that the lateral load capacity of unsafe URM piers can be enhanced up to 3.67 times and made safe using the applied retrofitting technique.Further,the retrofitting design methodology and recommendations for application procedures to on-site URM buildings are discussed in detail.