A FUNDAMENTAL STUDY ON THE SEISMIC RESPONSES OF GROUND

摘要

A new approach to the evaluation of seismic site responses is proposed in this paper. The proposed method involves integration of the distinct element method (DEM) into a soil column model with each soil layer capable of transmitting horizontally polarized S waves and vertically propagating P waves. The motivation for the development was rather straightforward; all existing site response methods have some shortcomings and limitations. The major shortcomings are in most cases related to the constitutive models employed; most constitutive soil models have potential difficulties of reproducing the stress-strain relations of soils undergoing large strains and deformation. However, from the designer's viewpoint, such soil behavior is of most importance. The present study indicates the feasibility of the proposed new approach, although the method itself is extremely computing intensive.