Sharif Digital Repository

Many important public buildings have suffered significant damages due to terrorist attacks in the last few decades. This paper investigates the behavior of structures with steel plate shear wall lateral load resisting system under various blast loadings. A number of twenty steel frames with different heights and widths subjected to four different blast scenarios are modeled and analyzed in opensees software. The results showed that structures with steel plate shear wall systems subjected to blast loading have better behavior in high-rise structures than in low-rise structures in terms of drift and ductility ratio. The steel plate shear wall system exhibited shear-dominated,... 

Recently, a novel structural system, which is defined as a damped outrigger system, has been proposed to control the dynamic vibration of tall buildings. This paper examines the seismic performance of tall buildings involving multiple outriggers equipped with viscous dampers. In this respect, a dual structural system (braced moment frame) is selected as a bare structure. In addition, the number and position of outriggers are assumed to be variable along the structure height. Nonlinear Response History Analysis (RHA) is performed to evaluate the efficiency of the damped-outrigger system under eight-scaled ground motions. The results are presented based on the average of all ground motions.... 

A novel nanohybrid composite of TiO2, SiO2, γ-Fe2O3, and reduced graphene oxide (TiO2@Si:Fe:rGO) is fabricated by the sol-gel method. The properties of the coated film were examined by structural and self-cleaning analyses using simulated discoloration/soiling and roofing tests. The fabricated transparent TiO2@Si:Fe:rGO composite showed excellent photoactivity and wettability, behaving well in self-cleaning applications. The addition of SiO2 improved the crystalline structure and surface hydroxylation of TiO2 nanoparticles. γ-Fe2O3 decreased the recombination rate of e-/h+ pairs, and significantly improved photocatalytic activity under visible light. Moreover, rGO sheets as excellent... 

In an attempt to prolong the performance of the conventional Solar Chimney (SC) and enhance its efficiency, this contribution presents a kind of novel compound SC with the Photovoltaic (PV) module and Phase Change Material (PCM) called the SC-PV-PCM system. Using PCM not only improves the PV module performance but also extends the productive period of the SC. A three-dimensional quasi-steady computational fluid dynamics (CFD) model of the proposed system is developed. The developed model is used to investigate the effect of using PCMs with different melting points on the performance of the proposed system. It is demonstrated that the RT-50 provides superior performance among the studied... 

This paper proposes a methodology for generating surrogate single-degree-of-freedom (SDOF) models that can be utilized to estimate the probability distribution of the roof drift ratio of multistory buildings at various ground motion intensity measures. The use of an SDOF model as a surrogate for multistory buildings can significantly alleviate the high computational cost for probabilistic seismic demand assessment considering both model uncertainty and record-to-record variability. The surrogate SDOF model generated herein explicitly accounts for model uncertainties and can be used as an alternative to the nonlinear dynamic analysis of detailed building structures. Applications for such... 

Progressive building collapse occurs when failure of a structural component leads to the failure and collapse of surrounding members, possibly promoting additional failure. Global system collapse will occur if the damaged system is unable to reach a new static equilibrium configuration. The most common type of primary failure which led to the progressive collapse phenomenon, is the sudden removal of a column by various factors. In this study, a method is proposed to prevent progressive collapse phenomena in structures subjected to removal of a single column. A vierendeel peripheral frame at roof level is used to redistribute the removed column’s load on other columns of the structure. For... 

Roof greening is a new technique for improvement of outdoor thermal environment which influences air quality through its impacts on thermal and flow field. In order to examine effects of green roofs on reactive pollutant dispersion within urban street canyons, a computational fluid dynamics (CFD) model was employed which contained NO-NO2-O3 photochemistry and energy balance models. Simulations were performed for street canyons with different aspect ratios (H/W) of 0.5, 1.0, and 2.0 such that leaf area density (LAD) of green roofs changed. It was found that roof greening led distribution of pollutants to alter for H/W = 0.5 and 1.0 cases in such a manner that their averaged concentrations had... 

This paper presents the results of an experimental work in order to evaluate the performance of a novel proposed retrofitting technique on a typical dome-roof adobe building by shaking table tests. For this purpose, two specimens, scaled 2:3, were subjected to a total of nine shaking table tests. The unretrofitted specimen, constructed by common practice, is designed to evaluate seismic performance and vulnerability of dome-roof adobe houses. The retrofitted specimen, exactly duplicating the first specimen, is retrofitted based on the results obtained from unretrofitted specimen tests, and the improvement in seismic behavior of the structure is investigated. Zarand earthquake (2005) Chatrood... 

There are numerous studies on the behavior of Unreinforced Masonry (URM) walls in both in-plane (IP) and out-of-plane (OP) directions; however, few aimed at understanding the simultaneous contribution of these intrinsic responses during earthquakes. Undoubtedly, even a strong URM wall shows weakened capacity in the OP direction because of minor cracks and other damages in the IP direction, and this capacity reduction has not yet been accounted for in seismic codes. In this study, performance of three URM walls is evaluated by several numerical analyses in terms of the OP capacity reduction because of IP displacements and failure modes. Several parameters influencing the OP capacity have been... 

An effective procedure to incorporate kinematic interaction (KI) aspects in seismic analysis of soil-structures systems was presented. In this regard, first, the effect of KI on the structural response was investigated with special focus on the role of rocking component of foundation input motion (FIM). This was performed parametrically for a wide range of selected nondimensional parameters, which well define the introduced simplified soil-structure model. It was observed that ignoring the effect of rocking input motion may introduce errors, which can be on the unsafe side especially for slender structures with large embedment ratios. On the other hand, it was known that introducing the... 

Variational principle is used to derive the nonlinear response of the floating roof of cylindrical liquid storage tanks due to harmonic base excitations. The formulation accounts for nonlinearity due to large deflections of the floating roof. The derived nonlinear governing equation for the sloshing response of the floating roof has a cubic nonlinear stiffness term similar to the well known Duffing equation. It is shown that accounting for large deflections could substantially reduce the wave elevation for near resonance harmonic excitations. Evaluating the response of the nonlinear model for increasing amplitudes of near resonance harmonic excitations gives rise to the appearance of sub and... 

Domed roofs have been used in Iran and many other countries to cover large buildings such as mosques, shrines, churches, schools. They have been also employed in other buildings like bazaars or market places in Iran due to their favorable thermal performance. The aim of this research is to study about domed roofs thermal performance in order to determine how they can be helpful in reducing the maximum air temperature of inside buildings during the warm seasons considering all parameters like air flow around them, solar radiation, radiation heat transfer with the sky and the ground as well as some openings on the building. The results of the study show that the thermal performance of the... 

Applying integrated variational principles on fluid and deck plate to the large deflection analysis of floating roofs, this paper investigates the significance of the flexural and membrane components in the formulations of the deck plate. Integrated variational principles facilitate the treatment of the compatibility of deformation between floating roof and supporting liquid. Analysis results show that different assumptions about deck plate formulation commonly used in the literature, results in considerably different deflection and stress patterns on the floating roof. The results show that modeling of the deck plate as a flexural element rather than the membrane, by eliminating the need... 

In order to evaluate the seismic behavior of confined masonry buildings, based on Iranian seismic code design, a single storey full-scale unreinforced confined brick masonry building has been constructed on the shaking table facility at the Earthquake Engineering Research Center (EERC) of Sharif University of Technology. The 4 by 4 meter model consists of four brick masonry walls confined with reinforced mortar tie-columns and steel bond beams, with a traditional jack-arch roof system. Three of the wall panels contained openings of different sizes and geometries. The model was subjected to the scaled earthquake records of Bam, Tabas and El Centro, as well as a harmonic acceleration with... 

In nonlinear static (pushover) methods of analysis as an alternative to time history analysis, the capacity curve of the structure is established with respect to the roof displacement. Disproportionate increases in the roof displacement and even outright reversals of the higher modes can distort the capacity curve of the equivalent single degree of freedom system in these kinds of method, including MPA. To overcome this problem, recently, "Energy-Based" the Modal Pushover Analysis (Energy-Based MPA) method has been introduced. In this method, the absorbed energy and/or the external work in the pushover analysis is considered. Accordingly, the assessment of the Energy-Based MPA method is... 

Domed roofs have been used in Iran and many other countries to cover large buildings such as mosques, shrines, churches, schools, etc. However their favorable thermal performance made them to be employed in other buildings such as bazaars, or market places, in Iran. The aim of this study was to determine the air pressure distribution over domed roofs, employing a numerical method. In this investigation, a three-dimensional model and a laminar inlet air flow were considered. The k-ε RNG method was employed for the turbulent flow simulation method. Simulation was run under three conditions of windows and a hole on top of the dome being open, or closed. The results were compared with the... 

Solar radiation received and absorbed by four domed roofs was estimated and compared with that of a flat roof. The domed roofs all had the same base areas, and equal to that of the flat roof. One of the roofs considered was the dome of the St. Peter's Church in Rome. Compared with the other roofs considered, this dome had a higher aspect ratio. It was found that all domed roofs received more solar radiation than the flat roof. Considering glazed tiles to cover a selected dome in Iran and the dome of the St. Peter's Church, it was found that the solar radiation absorbed by these roofs is reduced appreciably. In the case of the dome of St. Peter's Church, the amount of radiation absorbed was... 

Domed roofs have been used in Iran and many other countries to cover large buildings such as mosques, shrines, churches, schools, etc. However their favorable thermal performance has allowed them to be employed in other buildings like bazaars, or market places in Iran. In this investigation, wind pressure coefficients were determined experimentally for a domed roof model in a boundary layer wind tunnel. The model was a 1/10 scale model of the dome of an old school in the city of Yazd, in the central desert region of Iran. The model included a number of windows at the collar of the dome, and a hole on its apex. A total of 48 pressure tabs were employed to measure the air pressure at various... 

Using domed roofs to reduce building solar load in hot arid area is one of Iranian mechanical engineering masterworks. The first application of these roofs was to cover large buildings such as mosques, shrines, etc. However their thermal performance made them to be employed in other buildings like bazaars. The aim of this study was to determine the air pressure and velocity distribution over domed roofs, by employing numerical methods. The results of this study will be used as the first step for thermal performance evaluation of domed roofs. © 2007 American Institute of Physics  

Pushover analysis is a simplified nonlinear analysis technique that can be used to estimate the dynamic demands imposed on a structure under earthquake excitations. One of the first steps taken in this approximate solution is to assess the maximum roof displacement, known as target displacement, using the base shear versus roof displacement diagram. That could be done by the socalled dynamic pushover analysis, i.e. a dynamic time history analysis of an equivalent single degree of freedom model of the original system, as well as other available approximate static methods. In this paper, a number of load patterns, including a new approach, are considered to construct the related pushover...