Experimental simulation of base‐isolated buildings pounding against moat wall and effects on superstructure response

Base‐isolated buildings are typically important facilities expected to remain functional after a major earthquake. However, their behavior under extreme ground shaking is not well understood. A series of earthquake simulator experiments were performed to assess performance limit states of seismically isolated buildings under strong ground motions, including pounding against a moat wall. The test setup consists of a quarter scale three‐story frame isolated at the base with friction pendulum bearings and a moat wall model. An effort was made to properly scale the strength and the stiffness of the frame relative to the bearings properties from a professionally designed isolated three‐story steel intermediate moment‐resisting frame so that realistic yielding mechanisms can be observed. The moat wall was modeled as either a rigid triangle steel stopper or a concrete wall of various thicknesses with soil backfill. The moat wall gap was set to various displacement increments to examine the sensitivity of this parameter and also to assess the effects of impact on the superstructure at different velocities. The test results indicate that the contact forces are largely dependent on the gap distance, impact velocity and wall flexibility and, in extreme cases, pounding can induce yielding in the superstructure. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

What causes the spread of model projections of ocean dynamic sea-level change in response to greenhouse gas forcing?

Sea levels of different atmosphere–ocean general circulation models (AOGCMs) respond to climate change forcing in different ways, representing a crucial uncertainty in climate change research. We isolate the role of the ocean dynamics in setting the spatial pattern of dynamic sea-level (ζ) change by forcing several AOGCMs with prescribed identical heat, momentum (wind) and freshwater flux perturbations. This method produces a ζ projection spread comparable in magnitude to the spread that results from greenhouse gas forcing, indicating that the differences in ocean model formulation are the cause, rather than diversity in surface flux change. The heat flux change drives most of the global pattern of ζ change, while the momentum and water flux changes cause locally confined features. North Atlantic heat uptake causes large temperature and salinity driven density changes, altering local ocean transport and ζ. The spread between AOGCMs here is caused largely by differences in their regional transport adjustment, which redistributes heat that was already in the ocean prior to perturbation. The geographic details of the ζ change in the North Atlantic are diverse across models, but the underlying dynamic change is similar. In contrast, the heat absorbed by the Southern Ocean does not strongly alter the vertically coherent circulation. The Arctic ζ change is dissimilar across models, owing to differences in passive heat uptake and circulation change. Only the Arctic is strongly affected by nonlinear interactions between the three air-sea flux changes, and these are model specific.

     

Different age response of zircon and monazite during the tectono-metamorphic evolution of a high grade paragneiss from the Ruhla Crystalline Complex,central Germany

Results of TIMS, SIMS and SEM analyses show that zircon and monazite in a high-grade paragneiss of the Ruhla Crystalline Complex, central Germany, were formed and/or altered during different stages of a tectono-metamorphic history between Early Devonian and Permian times. Detrital zircon cores of >460 Ma place an older limit on the age of anatexis, and show that the paragneiss sequence contains rocks at least as young as early Cambrian. Metamorphic zircon growth commenced at ~365 Ma, peaking at ~360–355 Ma at the same time that granite dykes were emplaced. In contrast, monazite in the paragneiss preserves little record of the metamorphic peak. Most monazite grains grew or were recrystallised in the Lower Carboniferous at ~339 Ma, contemporaneous with the emplacement of voluminous diorite and granite bodies. These intrusions and related tectonics caused some of the high-U zircon overgrowths to undergo moderate to severe Pb loss. A second Pb loss event, between 300 and 280 Ma, can be related to Late Carboniferous/Early Permian large-scale block faulting.Editorial responsibility: J. Hoefs     

Grain crushing in geoscience materials-Key issues on crushing response,measurement and modeling:Review and preface

Grain crushing is commonly encountered in deep foundation engineering,high rockfill dam engineering,railway engineering,mining engineering,coastal engineering,petroleum engineering,and other geoscience application.Grain crushing is affected by fundamental soil characteristics,such as their mineral strength,grain size and distribution,grain shape,density and specimen size,and also by external factors including stress magnitude and path,loading rate and duration,degree of saturation,temperature and geochemical environment.Crushable material becomes a series of different materials with the change in its grading during grain crushing,resulting in a decrease in strength and dilatancy and an increase in compressibility.Effects of grain crushing on strength,dilatancy,deformation and failure mechanisms have been extensively investigated through laboratory testing,discrete element method(DEM)modelling,Weibull statistics,and constitutive modelling within the framework of the extended crushing-dependent critical state theory or the energy-based theory.Eleven papers summarized in this review article for this special issue addressed the above issues in grain crushing through the advanced testing and modelling.     

The formation of high-grade ignimbrites, I: Experiments on high- and low-concentration transport systems containing sticky particles

 High-grade ignimbrites are thought to be deposited by pyroclastic flows at temperatures exceeding minimum welding temperature or even solidus temperature. Corresponding pyroclastic-flow particles range from plastic to partially liquid and are able to aggregate or coalesce. This contrasts with particles in pyroclastic flows producing unwelded ignimbrite, which are capable of elastic grain interactions. The low aspect ratio and great areal extent of high-grade ignimbrites requires transport in a particulate state either by (a) high-concentration mass flow facilitated by fluidizing gas reducing internal friction, or by (b) expanded turbulent flow of low but downward increasing concentration. This paper presents experiments designed to investigate the effects of plastic to liquid particles on these two contrasting transport mechanisms. Gas fluidization experiments using polyethyleneglycole (PEG) powders heated above minimum sintering (T_ms) and melting (T_m) temperatures cover a wide range of fluidization velocities (U_mf>U_a>0.6·U_t) but are always in the bubbly fluidization regime similar to fluidized ignimbrite ash, where particle volume concentration outside the bubbles is high (≈10^–1). When the powders reach a critical temperature T_m≥T≥T_ms, defluidization by catastrophic particle aggregation immediately commences in both stationary and laterally moving fluidized beds as well as in experiments using mixtures of high- and low-T_m (≥30 wt.%) PEG powders, when T≥T_ms of the lower-T_m powder. This indicates that extended particulate transport at T≥T_ms is not possible at such high particle concentrations. In the turbulent flow experiments, liquid sprays of molten PEG or water, vertically injected into a high-Re (>10⁴) horizontal air flow, form a low-concentration (10^–5 to 10^–4) turbulent suspension current. Proximal formation of partially coalesced aggregates, which settle faster than individual particles, causes the measured downstream decay of sedimentation rate to be steeper than predicted by theory of single solid-particle sedimentation from turbulent suspensions. As particles become finer downstream and coalescence efficiency decreases in response to cooling, more distally formed aggregates become too small and rare to modify sedimentation-rate decay from that of suspension flows containing solid particles. The key difference between the two transport systems is particle concentration, C. Since particle collision rate R_coll∝C², collision rates in fluidized beds are so high that all particles immediately aggregate when coalescence efficiency (1≥E_coal≥0) is larger than 10^-3. Low-concentration suspensions, on the other hand, require much higher values of E_coal for significant aggregation to occur. Dilute pyroclastic flows will have higher particle volume fractions (≈10^–3) than the experimental currents, but then viscous pyroclasts should have lower coalescence efficiencies than PEG droplets. Experimental results thus support an expanded turbulent transport mechanism of pyroclastic flows generating extensive high-grade ignimbrite sheets. Received: 28 August 1996 / Accepted: 3 December 1997     

Nocturnal Near-Surface Temperature,but not Flow Dynamics,can be Predicted by Microtopography in a Mid-Range Mountain Valley

We investigate nocturnal flow dynamics and temperature behaviour near the surface of a 170-m long gentle slope in a mid-range mountain valley. In contrast to many existing studies focusing on locations with significant topographic variations, gentle slopes cover a greater spatial extent of the Earth’s surface. Air temperatures were measured using the high-resolution distributed-temperature-sensing method within a two-dimensional fibre-optic array in the lowest metre above the surface. The main objectives are to characterize the spatio-temporal patterns in the near-surface temperature and flow dynamics, and quantify their responses to the microtopography and land cover. For the duration of the experiment, including even clear-sky nights with weak winds and strong radiative forcing, the classical cold-air drainage predicted by theory could not be detected. In contrast, we show that the airflow for the two dominant flow modes originates non-locally. The most abundant flow mode is characterized by vertically-decoupled layers featuring a near-surface flow perpendicular to the slope and strong stable stratification, which contradicts the expectation of a gravity-driven downslope flow of locally produced cold air. Differences in microtopography and land cover clearly affect spatio-temporal temperature perturbations. The second most abundant flow mode is characterized by strong mixing, leading to vertical coupling with airflow directed down the local slope. Here variations of microtopography and land cover lead to negligible near-surface temperature perturbations. We conclude that spatio-temporal temperature perturbations, but not flow dynamics, can be predicted by microtopography, which complicates the prediction of advective-heat components and the existence and dynamics of cold-air pools in gently sloped terrain in the absence of observations.     

Geochemical characteristics and Sr‐Nd‐Hf isotope compositions of Late Triassic post‐collisional A‐type granites in Sarudik,SW Sumatra,Indonesia

Late Triassic A‐type granites are identified in this study in Sarudik, SW Sumatra. We present new data on zircon U–Pb geochronology, whole‐rock major and trace elements and Sr‐Nd‐Hf isotope geochemistry, aiming to study their petrogenesis and tectonic implications. LA‐ICP‐MS U–Pb dating of zircon separated from one biotite monzogranite sample yields a concordia age of 222.6 ±1.0 Ma, indicating a Late Triassic magmatic event. The studied granites are classified as weakly peralumious, high‐K calc‐alkaline granites. They exhibit high SiO₂, K₂O + Na₂O, FeO/(FeO + MgO) and Ga/Al ratios and low Al₂O₃, CaO, MgO, P₂O₅ and TiO₂ contents, with enrichment of Rb, Th and U and depletion of Ba, Sr, P and Eu, showing the features of A‐type granites. The granites have zircon ε_Hf(t) values from ?4.6 to ?0.4 and whole‐rock ε_Nd(t) values from ?5.51 to ?4.98, with Mesoproterozoic T_DM2 ages (1278–1544 Ma) for both Hf and Nd isotopes. Geochemical and isotopic data suggest that the source of these A‐type granites is the Mesoproterozoic continental crust, without significant incorporation of mantle‐derived component, and their formation is controlled by subsequent fractional crystallization. The Sarudik A‐type granites are further assigned to A2‐type formed in post‐collisional environment. Combined with previous knowledge on the western SE Asia tectonic evolution, we conclude that the formation of the Late Triassic A‐type granites is related to the post‐collisional extension induced by the crustal thickening, gravitational collapse, and asthenosphere upwelling following the collision between the Sibumasu and the East Malaya Block.