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Reinforced concrete (RC) frames with masonry infills are frequently used in seismic regions all over the world. Generally masonry infills are considered as nonstructural elements and thus are typically neglected in the design process. However, the observations made after strong earthquakes have shown that masonry infills can modify the dynamic behavior of the structure significantly. The consequences were total collapses of buildings and loss of human lives. This paper presents the new system INODIS (Innovative Decoupled Infill System) developed within the European research project INSYSME (Innovative Systems for Earthquake Resistant Masonry Enclosures in RC Buildings). INODIS decouples the frame and the masonry infill by means of special U-shaped rubbers placed in between frame and infill. The effectiveness of the system was investigated by means of full scale tests on RC frames with masonry infills subjected to in-plane and out-of-plane loading. Furthermore small specimen tests were conducted to determine material characteristics of the components and the resistances of the connections. Finally, a micromodel was developed to simulate the in-plane behavior of RC frames infilled with AAC blocks with and without installation of the INODIS system.
A further development of the Added-Mass-Method allows the combined representation of the effects of both soil-structure-interaction and fluid-structure interaction on a liquid-filled-tank in one model. This results in a practical method for describing the dynamic fluid pressure on the tank shell during joint movement. The fluid pressure is calculated on the basis of the tank's eigenform and the earthquake acceleration and represented by additional masses on the shell. The bearing on compliant ground is represented by replacement springs, which are calculated dependent on the local soil composition. The influence of the shear modulus of the compliant soil is clearly visible in the pressure curves and the stress distribution in the shell. The acceleration spectra are also dependent on soil stiffness. According to Eurocode-8 the acceleration spectra are determined for fixed soil-classes, instead of calculating the accelerations for each site in direct dependence on the soil composition. This leads to unrealistic sudden changes in the system's response. Therefore, earthquake spectra are calculated for different soil models in direct dependence of the shear modulus. Thus, both the acceleration spectra and the replacement springs match the soil composition. This enables a reasonable and consistent calculation of the system response for the actual conditions at each site.
Reinforced concrete (RC) structures with masonry infills are widely used for several types of buildings all over the world. However, it is well known that traditional masonry infills constructed with rigid contact to the surrounding RC frame performed rather poor in past earthquakes. Masonry infills showed severe in-plane damages and failed in many cases under out-of-plane seismic loading. As the undesired interactions between frames and infills changes the load transfer on building level, complete collapses of buildings were observed. A possible solution is uncoupling of masonry infills to the frame to reduce the infill contribution activated by the frame deformation under horizontal loading. The paper presents numerical simulations on RC frames equipped with the innovative decoupling system INODIS. The system was developed within the European project INSYSME and allows an effective uncoupling of frame and infill. The simulations are carried out with a micro-modelling approach, which is able to predict the complex nonlinear behaviour resulting from the different materials and their interaction. Each brick is modelled individually and connected taking into account nonlinearity of a brick mortar interface. The calibration of the model is based on small specimen tests and experimental results for one bay one storey frame are used for the validation. The validated model is further used for parametric studies on two storey and two bay infilled frames. The response and change of the structural stiffness are analysed and compared to the traditionally infilled frame. The results confirm the effectiveness of the INODIS system with less damage and relatively low contribution of the infill at high drift levels. In contrast to the uncoupled system configurations, traditionally infilled frames experienced brittle failure at rather low drift levels.
In collaborative research projects, both researchers and practitioners work together solving business-critical challenges. These projects often deal with ETL processes, in which humans extract information from non-machine-readable documents by hand. AI-based machine learning models can help to solve this problem.
Since machine learning approaches are not deterministic, their quality of output may decrease over time. This fact leads to an overall quality loss of the application which embeds machine learning models. Hence, the software qualities in development and production may differ.
Machine learning models are black boxes. That makes practitioners skeptical and increases the inhibition threshold for early productive use of research prototypes. Continuous monitoring of software quality in production offers an early response capability on quality loss and encourages the use of machine learning approaches. Furthermore, experts have to ensure that they integrate possible new inputs into the model training as quickly as possible.
In this paper, we introduce an architecture pattern with a reference implementation that extends the concept of Metrics Driven Research Collaboration with an automated software quality monitoring in productive use and a possibility to auto-generate new test data coming from processed documents in production.
Through automated monitoring of the software quality and auto-generated test data, this approach ensures that the software quality meets and keeps requested thresholds in productive use, even during further continuous deployment and changing input data.
A German–Brazilian research project investigates sugarcane as an energy plant in anaerobic digestion for biogas production. The aim of the project is a continuous, efficient, and stable biogas process with sugarcane as the substrate. Tests are carried out in a fermenter with a volume of 10 l.
In order to optimize the space–time load to achieve a stable process, a continuous process in laboratory scale has been devised. The daily feed in quantity and the harvest time of the substrate sugarcane has been varied. Analyses of the digester content were conducted twice per week to monitor the process: The ratio of inorganic carbon content to volatile organic acid content (VFA/TAC), the concentration of short-chain fatty acids, the organic dry matter, the pH value, and the total nitrogen, phosphate, and ammonium concentrations were monitored. In addition, the gas quality (the percentages of CO₂, CH₄, and H₂) and the quantity of the produced gas were analyzed.
The investigations have exhibited feasible and economical production of biogas in a continuous process with energy cane as substrate. With a daily feeding rate of 1.68gᵥₛ/l*d the average specific gas formation rate was 0.5 m3/kgᵥₛ. The long-term study demonstrates a surprisingly fast metabolism of short-chain fatty acids. This indicates a stable and less susceptible process compared to other substrates.
New coupled finite-infinite element approach for wave propagation simulation of unbounded soil media
(2014)
Evaluation of fragility curves for a three-storey-reinforced-concrete mock-up of SMART 2013 project
(2016)
Textile reinforced concrete. Part I: Process model for collaborative research and development
(2003)
Risk management for structures with a risk of explosion should be considered very carefully when performing a risk analysis according to IEC 62305-2. In contrast to the 2006 edition of the standard, the 2010 edition describes the topic “Structures with a risk of explosion” in more detail. Moreover, in Germany separate procedures and parameters are defined for the risk analysis of structures with a risk of explosion (Supplement 3 of the German DIN EN 62305-2 standard). This paper describes the contents and the relevant calculations of this Supplement 3, together with a numerical example.
The 2nd edition of the lightning risk management
standard (IEC 62305-2) considers structures, which may
endanger environment. In these cases, the loss is not limited to
the structure itself, which is valid for usual structures. In the past
(Edition 1) this danger was simply taken into account by a special
hazard factor, multiplying the existing risk for the structure with
a number. Now, in the edition 2, we add to the risk for the
structure itself a “second risk” due to the losses outside the
structure. The losses outside can be treated independently from
what occurs inside. This is a major advantage to analyze the risk
for sensitive structures, like chemical plants, nuclear plants, or
structures containing explosives, etc. In this paper, the existing
procedure given by the European version EN 62305-2 Ed.2 is
further developed and applied to a few structures.
This paper describes two courses on
simulation methods for graduate students:
“Simulation Methods” and “Simulation and
Optimization in Virtual Engineering” The
courses were planned to teach young engineers
how to work with simulation software as well as
to understand the necessary mathematical background.
As simulation software COMSOL is
used. The main philosophy was to combine
theory and praxis in a way that motivates the
students. In addition “soft skills” should be
improved. This was achieved by project work as
final examination. As underlying didactical principle
the ideas of Bloom’s revised taxonomy
were followed. The paper basically focusses on
educational aspects, e.g. how to structure the
course, plan the exercises, organize the project
work and include practical COMSOL examples.
The Solar-Institute Jülich (SIJ) has initiated the construction of the first and only German solar tower power plant and is now involved in the accompanying research. The power plant for experimental and demonstration purposes in the town of Jülich started supplying electric energy in the beginning of 2008. The central receiver plant features as central innovation an open volumetric receiver, consisting of porous ceramic elements that simultaneously absorb the concentrated sunlight and transfer the heat to ambient air passing through the pores so that an average temperature of 680°C is reached. The subsequent steam cycle generates up to 1.5 MWe. A main field of research at the SIJ is the optimization of the absorber structures. To analyze the capability of new absorber specimens a special test facility was developed and set up in the laboratory. A high-performance near-infrared radiator offers for single test samples a variable and repeatable beam with a power of up to 320 kW/m² peak. The temperatures achieved on the absorber surface can reach more than 1000°C. To suck ambient air through the open absorber - like on the tower - it is mounted on a special blower system. An overview about the test facility and some recent results will be presented.
Lightning safety guidelines
(2010)
This paper introduces lightning to the layman, noting the right behaviour in front of thunderstorms as well as protective measures against lightning. It also contributes to the prevention of lightning injuries and damages. This report was prepared by the authors inside the AHG1 Group for IEC TC81 (Lightning Protection).
Large power plants can be endangered by lightning strikes with possible consequences regarding their safety and availability. A special scenario is a lightning strike to the HV overhead transmission line close to the power plant's connection to the power grid. If then additionally a so-called shielding failure of the overhead ground wire on top of the overhead transmission line is assumed, i.e. the lightning strikes directly into a phase conductor, this is an extreme electromagnetic disturbance. The paper deals with the numerical simulation of such a lightning strike and the consequences on the components of the power plant's auxiliary power network connected to different voltage levels.
Planning the air-terminations for a structure to be protected the use of the rolling-sphere method (electro-geometrical model) is the best way from the physics of lightning point-of-view. Therefore, international standards prefer this method. However, using the rolling-sphere method only results in possible point-of-strikes on a structure without giving information about the probability of strikes at the individual points compared to others.
In the presented paper data collected from the field related to damage statistics of electrical and electronic apparatus in household are reported and investigated. These damages (total number approx. 74000 cases), registered by five German insurance companies in 2005 and 2006, were adviced by customers as caused by lightning overvoltages. With the use of stochastical methods it is possible, to reasses the collected data and to distinguish between cases, which are with high probability caused by lightning overvoltages, and those, which are not. If there was an indication for a direct strike, this case was excluded, so the focus was only on indirect lightning flashes, i.e. only flashes to ground near the structure and flashes to or nearby an incoming service line were investigated. The data from the field contain the location of damaged apparatus (residence of the policy holder) and the distances of the nearest cloud-to-ground stroke to the location of the damage registered by the German lightning location network BLIDS at the date of damage. The statistical data along with some complementary numerical simulations allow to verify the correspondence of the Standards rules used for IEC 62305-2 with the field data and to define some correction needs. The results could lead to a better understanding whether a damage reported to an insurance company is really caused by indirect lightning, or not.