Zhai Changhai

Study on inelastic displacement ratio spectra for near-fault pulse-type ground motions

In displacement-based seismic design, inelastic displacement ratio spectra (IDRS) are particularly useful for estimating the maximum lateral inelastic displacement demand of a nonlinear SDOF system from the maximum elastic displacement demand of its counterpart linear elastic SDOF system. In this study, the characteristics of IDRS for near-fault pulse-type ground motions are investigated based on a great number of earthquake ground motions. The influence of site conditions, ratio of peak ground velocity (PGV) to peak ground acceleration (PGA), the PGV, and the maximum incremental velocity (MIV) on IDRS are also evaluated. The results indicate that the effect of near-fault ground motions on IDRS are significant only at periods between 0.2 s–1.5 s, where the amplification can approach 20%. The PGV/PGA ratio has the most significant influence on IDRS among the parameters considered. It is also found that site conditions only slightly affect the IDRS.

Comparison of perfectly matched layer and multi-transmitting formula artificial boundary condition based on hybrid finite element formulation

The theory of perfectly matched layer (PML) artificial boundary condition (ABC), which is characterized by absorption any wave motions with arbitrary frequency and arbitrarily incident angle, is introduced. The construction process of PML boundary based on elastodynamic partial differential equation (PDE) system is developed. Combining with velocity-stress hybrid finite element formulation, the applicability of PML boundary is investigated and the numerical reflection of PML boundary is estimated. The reflectivity of PML and multi-transmitting formula (MTF) boundary is then compared based on body wave and surface wave simulations. The results show that although PML boundary yields some reflection, its absorption performance is superior to MTF boundary in the numerical simulations of near-fault wave propagation, especially in corner and large angle grazing incidence situations. The PML boundary does not arise any unstable phenomenon and the stability of PML boundary is better than MTF boundary in hybrid finite element method. For a specified problem and analysis tolerance, the computational efficiency of PML boundary is only a little lower than MTF boundary.