Sharif Digital Repository

In this paper, the significance of soil–structure interaction (SSI) in optimal placement of viscous dampers in steel frames is studied. Optimal placement of dampers is determined with the purpose of achieving performance objectives at three hazard levels using genetic algorithm optimization. Endurance time method is used for seismic nonlinear response analysis of the fixed-base and SSI included frames. The soil beneath the structures is considered as a homogeneous elastic half-space, and the soil–structure systems are modeled by the substructure method. Results indicate that at low excitation intensities, consideration of SSI results in maximum drift ratio reduction at all stories of the... 

The use of advanced cycles to take advantage of the gas turbine's thermodynamic characteristics has received increasing attention in recent years. These cycles have been developed for large scale power generation. Due to the powerful abilities of bio-inspired computing techniques such as Genetic Algorithm in locating the optimal (or near optimal) solutions to a given optimization problem, they are widely utilized for determining the parameters of different engineering systems in order to meet the specified performance objectives for a given problem. In order to illustrate the performance of one of these techniques, development and application of it for an engineering problem is presented. In... 

Based on special properties of metal dampers such as high energy dissipation, stable hysteric cycles, simple application, low cost, insensitivity to changes of temperature and the ability to substitute after the occurrence of earthquakes, they are being used for structural control. One of these metal dampers which has been of special interest is the tapered steel slit damper (TSS). When shear forces are applied, this damper yields and enters the plastic zone. The TSS damper is made of pieces of standard wide flanges where slits have been extracted from their web. These dampers are connected to the top of the chevron braces and under the middle of the beams. In the endurance time (ET) method... 

In the Endurance Time (ET) method, structures are subjected to a calibrated intensifying accelerogram and their performance is assessed based on their response at various equivalent intensity levels. Application of the ET method in performance-based design of structures has been studied by introducing a continuous performance target curve, which expresses the limit of the proper seismic performance of a structure along various times of the ET accelerogram. The correlation between time in the ET method and the return period for different structural periods is investigated. The procedure is based on the coincidence of response spectra obtained from the ET accelerogram at different times and... 

The Endurance Time (ET) method is a new dynamic pushover procedure in which structures are subjected to gradually intensifying acceleration functions and their performance is assessed based on the length of the time interval that they can satisfy required performance objectives. In this paper, the accuracy of the Endurance Time method in estimating average deformation demands of low and medium rise steel frames using ETASOf series of ET acceleration functions has been investigated. The precision of the ET method in predicting the response of steel frames in nonlinear analysis is investigated by considering a simple set of moment-resisting frames. An elastic-perfectly-plastic material model... 

Background: Kinematic indices (KIs) are frequently used as objective measures to assess the upper extremities motor performance in post stroke patients. The clinimetric analysis of these indices has been mostly limited to their averaged values over different directions of reaching movements. Recent studies indicate direction dependencies of such motor performances due to neural and/or biomechanical causes. The direction dependencies of such indices and their clinimetric parameters remains to be investigated. Methods: An apparatus was built to perform and measure planar point-to-point reaching tasks in 8 directions using a virtual reality environment. 24 stroke and 18 healthy individuals... 

When the network suffers from congestion, the core or edge routers signal the incidence of congestion through the active queue management (AQM) to the sources. The time-varying nature of the network dynamics and the complex process of retuning the current AQM algorithms for different operating points necessitate the development of a new AQM algorithm. Since the non-minimum phase characteristics of the network dynamics restrict direct application of the proportional-integral-derivative (PID) controller, we propose a compensated PID controller based on a new control strategy addressing the phase-lag and restrictions caused by the delay. Based on the unstable internal dynamics caused by the... 

In this paper, a practical method is developed for performance-based design of RC structures subjected to seismic excitations. More efficient design is obtained by redistributing material from strong to weak parts of a structure until a state of uniform deformation or damage prevails. By applying the design algorithm on 5, 10 and 15-storey RC frames, the efficiency of the proposed method is initially demonstrated for specific synthetic and real seismic excitations. The results indicate that, for similar structural weight, designed structures experience up to 30% less global damage compared with code-based design frames. The method is then developed to consider multiple performance objectives... 

A new design methodology based on the total value of structures is introduced. This methodology, namely Value Based Design of structures (VBD), uses the advantages of Endurance Time (ET) method. While prescriptive and earlier generations of performance based design approaches commonly try to find structures with the least initial cost, a design approach to directly incorporate the concept of value in design procedure has been formulated here. Reduced computational effort in ET analysis provides the prerequisites to practical use of optimization algorithms in seismic design. A genetic algorithm is used with the objective of minimizing total cost of the building during its lifespan. ET method... 

Some fundamental and unique characteristics of space are (1) global perspective, (2) above the atmosphere, (3) gravity-free environment, (4) abundant resources, and (5) exploration of space itself. If the mission doesn't rely on some fundamental and unique characteristics of space, it will likely cost more to do in space than in air or on Earth [1]. On the other hand, design of complex systems like satellites involves selecting design parameters (DPs) to satisfy the required constraints while meeting desired performance objectives. These parameters are often coupled, and their relationships not easily understood, and it makes the design an iterative process with high complexity [2]. But in...