LEBANESE UNIVERSITY

FACULTY OF ENGINEERING

Master 2 Research Dissertation

Submitted in fulfillment of the requirements for the Master's 2 Research degree in

Natural risks in civil engineering

Prepared by:
Marc KALFAT

Taking seismic signals into account for dimensioning of structures

using a group of real signals compatible with the spectrum of EC8

Supervised by:
Dr. Maria Paola Santisi d’Avila

Defended on 11th of September 2019

The jury is composed of:

Dr. Dalia Abdel Massih Supervisor

Dr. Elie Awad Reviewer
Dr. Cecile Cornou Examiner
 Master Sciences de la Terre et des planètes, Environnement
Attestation de non plagiat

Je soussigné
Marc KALFAT

Auteur du mémoire

« Taking seismic signals into account for dimensioning of structures

using a group of real signals compatible with the spectrum of EC8 »

Déclare sur l’honneur que ce mémoire est le fruit d’un travail personnel et que je n’ai ni contrefait, ni
falsifié, ni copié tout ou partie de l’œuvre d’autrui afin de la faire passer pour la mienne.

Toutes les sources d’information utilisées et les citations d’auteur ont été mentionnées conformément aux
usages en vigueur.

Je suis conscient que le fait de ne pas citer une source ou de ne pas la citer clairement et complètement est
constitutif de plagiat, et que le plagiat est considéré comme une faute grave au sein de l’Université, pouvant
être sévèrement sanctionnée par la loi.

Fait à Roumieh (Liban)

Le 10 septembre 2019

Signature

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 ACKNOWLEDGMENT

First, I would like to express my sincere gratitude to my supervisor Dr. Maria Paola SANTISI d’AVILA
for the continuous support of my work, for her patience, motivation, and immense knowledge. her
guidance helped me in all the time of research and writing of this report. I could not have imagined
having better adviser and mentor for my internship.

Besides my adviser, my sincere thanks go to Dr. Dalia ABDEL MASSIH, coordinator of RNGC
master, for her continuous support and assistance and for her hard work making this master’s degree
a real opportunity for ambitious students.

Last of all but not the least, I wish to accredit my family and friends for their continuous support
which has given me the strength and confidence to complete my project.

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 ABSTRACT

The seismic design of buildings is currently done using the modal response spectrum analysis of the
EuroCode8, which is a static model composed of the maximum amplitude of the acceleration provided by
the SDOF response spectrum for different buildings periods by using an input motion. the modal response
spectrum is then derived using statistical elaboration of the spectra of earthquakes that could possibly
struck the area of interest.
EuroCode 8 offers an alternative which is the use of seismic signals, but this approach is not used in practice
professional because of the difficulty of meeting the compatibility criteria with the response spectrum
imposed by EuroCode 8. The advantages of using seismic signals in seismic design or in evaluating
vulnerability of structures, it’s to be able to follow the behavior of the structure in the time, under a dynamic
loading, and thus to be able to reproduce the progression of damage.
This present study consists of generating synthetic signals that can be used for the seismic design of
buildings by using available signals for a fixed period and for a chosen area.

A first part of the study will be a classification of available signals, for a fixed period and for a selected
area (magnitude, soil type, epicentral distance and slope of the ground).
A second part of the work plans to analyze the recorded signals and take out the dynamic parameters used
in the generation of synthetic signals and then make probability distribution curves of each parameter.
These curves will be used to generate a random value of each parameter to generate a unique artificial
signal that can be used as an input motion in the seismic design of signals.
A third part of the study will be to generate synthetic signals using the data recovered from real ground
motions and check the compatibility of the results.

The study has been conducted by using Visual Fortran software and by coding 2 separate spreadsheets, the
first one analyses the available seismic signals and recovers the dynamic parameters from each one and
the second one reads the analyzed data and generate a set of synthetic signals.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS
1- INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................................................ 6
2- SEISMIC ANALYSIS METHODS ..................................................................................................... 7
a) Equivalent static analysis ...................................................................................................................... 7
b) Response spectrum analysis ................................................................................................................. 7
c) Time History Analysis .......................................................................................................................... 7
3- STATE OF THE ART .......................................................................................................................... 9
4- STRATEGY ADOPTED .................................................................................................................... 16
a) Overview............................................................................................................................................. 16
b) Ground Motions.................................................................................................................................. 17
c) Analysis of the recorded accelerograms ............................................................................................. 19
i. Modulating Function ....................................................................................................................... 19
ii. Zero Crossing Function .................................................................................................................. 22
iii. Power Spectral Density Function .................................................................................................. 23
iv. Output of the Analysis ................................................................................................................... 25
d) Generation of synthetic seismic signals.............................................................................................. 28
5- RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS....................................................................................................... 30
6- CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................... 35
APPENDIX 1.............................................................................................................................................. 36
REFERENCES ........................................................................................................................................... 38

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LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 1:Risk of seismic activity across Italy (INGV) ...............................................................................18

Figure 2 : Modulating function compared with the Absolute value of the acceleration time history ........20

Figure 3: Cumulative normalized Husid integral of recorded signals compared with calculated ones for 2
sample signals .............................................................................................................................................21

Figure 4 : fitted Positive zero crossing rate compared with the calculated ones for 2 sample signals ......22

Figure 5 : Fitted power spectral density function compared with the calculated one for 2 sample signals24

Figure 6:Normalized cumulative probability density function of the modulating function parameters ....25

Figure 7: Normalized cumulative probability density function ..................................................................26

Figure 8 : Acceleration time histories of a generated 3 dimensional seismic signal : ................................31

Figure 9: Acceleration time history of a generated 3 dimensional seismic signal : ..................................32

Figure 10 : Target spectrum comparison ....................................................................................................34

LIST OF TABLES
Table 1 : Probabilistic properties of the modulating function parameters ..................................................27

Table 2:Probabilistic properties of the zero crossing function parameters .................................................27

Table 3:Probabilistic properties of the power spectral density function parameters ..................................27

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 1- INTRODUCTION
Among the natural phenomena that have worried human kind, earthquakes are without doubt the most
distressing one. The fact that, so far, the occurrence of earthquakes has been unpredictable, makes them
especially feared by the common citizen, for he feels there is no way to assure an effective preparedness.

The most feared effects of earthquakes are collapses of constructions, for they not only usually imply
human casualties but represent huge losses for individuals as well as for the community, although other
consequences of earthquakes may include landslides, soil liquefaction and tsunamis.

The fundamental goals of any structural design are safety, serviceability and economy. Achieving these
goals for design in seismic regions is especially important and difficult. Uncertainty and unpredictability
of when, where and how a seismic event will strike a community increases the overall difficulty. In
addition, lack of understanding and ability to estimate the performance of constructed facilities makes it
difficult to achieve the above mentioned goals.

Several methods are available for the structural analysis of buildings and other civil engineering works
under seismic actions. The differences between the methods lie in the way they incorporate the seismic
input and in the idealization of the structure. All methods of analysis must serve the current design
philosophy for seismic actions which requires that a structure must not collapse and must retain its
structural integrity under the strong earthquakes. The structure also must be protected against damage and
limitations of use under moderate earthquakes. To avoid collapse, the structure is allowed to develop plastic
zones in which seismic energy is dissipated.

The earliest provisions for seismic resistance were the requirement to design for a lateral force equal to a
proportion of the building weight (applied at each floor level). This approach was adopted in the appendix
of the 1927 Uniform Building Code (UBC), which was used on the west coast of the United States. It later
became clear that the dynamic properties of the structure affected the loads generated during an earthquake.
In the Los Angeles County Building Code of 1943 a provision to vary the load based on the number of
floor levels was adopted (based on research carried out at Caltech in collaboration with Stanford University
and the U.S. Coast and Geodetic Survey, which started in 1937). The concept of "response spectra" was
developed in the 1930s, but it wasn't until 1952 that a joint committee of the San Francisco Section of the
ASCE and the Structural Engineers Association of Northern California (SEAONC) proposed using the
building period (the inverse of the frequency) to determine lateral forces.

Earthquake engineering has developed a lot since the early days, and some of the more complex designs
now use special earthquake protective elements either just in the foundation (base isolation) or distributed
throughout the structure.

According to building codes, the seismic analysis of structures can be done using different methods, and
currently the most used one is the modal response spectrum analysis.

The different methods of seismic analysis used over the years are developed in what follows.

6
 2- SEISMIC ANALYSIS METHODS

a) Equivalent static analysis

This approach defines a series of forces acting on a building to represent the effect of earthquake ground
motion, typically defined by a seismic design response spectrum. It assumes that the building responds in
its fundamental mode. For this to be true, the building must be low-rise and must not twist significantly
when the ground moves. The response is read from a design response spectrum, given the natural
frequency of the building (either calculated or defined by the building code). The applicability of this
method is extended in many building codes by applying factors to account for higher buildings with
some higher modes, and for low levels of twisting. To account for effects due to "yielding" of the
structure, many codes apply modification factors that reduce the design forces (e.g. force reduction
factors).

b) Response spectrum analysis

This approach permits the multiple modes of response of a building to be taken into account (in the
frequency domain). This is required in many building codes for all except very simple or very complex
structures. The response of a structure can be defined as a combination of many special shapes (modes)
that in a vibrating string correspond to the "harmonics". Computer analysis can be used to determine
these modes for a structure. For each mode, a response is read from the design spectrum, based on the
modal frequency and the modal mass, and they are then combined to provide an estimate of the total
response of the structure. In this we have to calculate the magnitude of forces in all directions i.e. X, Y &
Z and then see the effects on the building. Combination methods include the following:

 Absolute – peak values are added together

 Square root of the sum of the squares (SRSS)
 Complete quadratic combination (CQC) – a method that is an improvement on SRSS for closely
spaced modes
The result of a response spectrum analysis using the response spectrum from a ground motion is typically
different from that which would be calculated directly from a linear dynamic analysis using that ground
motion directly, since phase information is lost in the process of generating the response spectrum.

In cases where structures are either too irregular, too tall or of significance to a community in disaster
response, the response spectrum approach is no longer appropriate, and more complex analysis is often
required, such as time history analysis.

c) Time History Analysis

It is an important technique for structural seismic analysis especially when the evaluated structural
response is nonlinear. To perform such an analysis, a representative earthquake time history is required
for a structure being evaluated.

Time history analysis is a step-by step analysis of the dynamic response of a structure to a specified
loading that may vary with time. it is used to determine the seismic response of a structure under
dynamic loading of representative earthquake.

Time history analysis has been widely used for seismic design and qualification of structures in several
applications such as nuclear energy facilities, and high rise buildings.

7
To realistically characterize the seismic hazard environment, a set of representative tri-directional
earthquake time-histories, which are statistically independent of each other, is required for this analysis
method.

There are three types of earthquake time-histories for time history analysis procedure: actual earthquake
records, spectrum-compatible artificial/synthetic earthquake time-histories, and spectrum compatible
time-histories based on actual earthquake records.

In this study artificial earthquake time histories are generated using actual earthquake records. These
seismic signals can be used in the seismic design of structures which can be practically used as an input
motion in structural design software to obtain the structure seismic response at every step of time.

8
 3- STATE OF THE ART
Different references were used in this study to understand well the background of this topic and use it as
a basis to the work done.

It is well understood from study of recorded accelerograms that earthquake ground motion is generally a
nonstationary random process in which both intensity and frequency content change with time (Yeh and
Wen 1990). So first the paper of “Deodatis 1996” was very useful to comprehend how sample functions
of a non-stationary, multi-variate stochastic process can be generated.

Deodatis Considered a 1D-3V (one-dimensional, tri-variate) nonstationary stochastic vector process with
components f10(t), f20(t), and f30(t) having mean value equal to zero.

(1)

The cross correlation matrix and the cross spectral density function are given by:

(2)

(3)

because of the non-stationarity of the vector process, the cross-correlation matrix is a function of two time
instants: t and t + τ (t = time and τ = time lag), while the cross-spectral density matrix is a function of both
frequency w and time τ.

(4)

(5)

The modulating function Aj (ω, t) represents the change in the evolutionary power spectrum, relative to the
(stationary) power spectral density function Sj(ω).

Consequently, for any time instant t, elements of the cross-spectral density matrix are real and non-negative
functions of w satisfying:

(6)

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 (7)

(8)

The elements of the cross-correlation matrix are related to the corresponding elements of the cross-spectral
density matrix through the following transformations:

(9)

(10)

where Aj (ω, t), j=1,2,3 are the modulating functions of f10(t), f20(t), and f30(t), respectively,

Sj(ω), j = 1,2,3 are the stationary power spectral density functions of f10(t), f20(t), and f30(t), respectively,

Ӷjk(ω) j, k =1,2,3, j ≠ k are the complex coherence functions between fj°(t) and fk°(t).

In order to simulate the 1D-3V non-stationary stochastic process fj0(t), j = 1,2,3, Deodatis decomposed its
cross-spectral density matrix S° (ω, t) at every time instant t under consideration, into the following
product:

(11)

This decomposition can be performed using Cholesky's method, in which case H (ω, t) is lower triangular
matrix:

(12)

The diagonal elements of the previous matrix H (ω, t) are real and functions of w and whose off-diagonal
generally complex functions of w.

10
The following relation is satisfied by the elements of H (ω, t):

(13)

(14)

(15)

Once matrix S° (ω, t) is decomposed according to equations (11) - (12), the non-stationary stochastic
vector process fj°(t), j = 1,2,3 can be simulated by the following series as N→ ∞.

(16)

wu represents an upper cut-off frequency beyond which the elements of the cross-spectral density
matrix may be assumed to be zero for any time instant t. As such, wu is a fixed value and hence Δw→0
as N→∞ so that NΔw = wu.

The ϕ1l, ϕ2l, and ϕ3l (l=1, 2…, N) are three sequences of independent random phase angles distributed
uniformly over the interval [0, 2π].
And it should be noted that the simulated non-stationary stochastic vector process fj(t), j = 1,2,3 is
asymptotically Gaussian as N→ ∞ because of the central limit theorem.

Cacciola took the results of the traditional spectral-representation-method for simulating stochastic
processes described by Deodatis 1996 to apply it in earthquake engineering. The study done by Deodatis
was based on a one dimensional tri-variate non-stationary random process, and to apply it on acceleration
time histories, Cacciola considered a one-dimensional and uni-variate Gaussian non-stationary stochastic
process f(t), the simulation of the samples through the spectral representation method is performed using
the following equation:

(17)

where

The power spectral density function S (ω, t) is defined by

(18)

11
Where A (ω, t) is the modulating function and S(ω) is the stationary power spectral density function of
the stochastic process f(t).

For the purposes of his study commonly used for earthquake engineering applications the stationary
power spectra were considered in conjunction with Eq. (18) namely, the Kanai-Tajimi (K-T) spectrum
which was later modified by Clough-Penzien (C-P) are given in the equations below:

𝜔 2
1 + 4𝜁𝑔2 (𝜔𝑔)
SKT(w) = (𝟏𝟗)
2 2 2
𝜔 𝜔
(1 − (𝜔𝑔) ) + 4𝜁𝑔2 (𝜔𝑔)

𝜔 4
( )
𝜔𝑓
SCP(w) = SKT(w) 2
(𝟐𝟎)
𝜔 2 𝜔 2
(1 − ( ) ) + 4𝜁𝑓 2 ( )
𝜔𝑓 𝜔𝑓

These phenomenological models account for the influence of the surface soil deposits on the frequency
content of the propagating seismic waves via the “stiffness” (ωg) and “damping” (ζg) parameters. The
Clough-Penzien spectrum incorporates an additional high-pass filter whose “cut-off frequency” and
“steepness” are determined by the parameters “ωf” and “ζf”. This filter suppresses the low frequencies
allowed by the Kanai-Tajimi spectrum: a quite desirable property to realistically capture the frequency
content exhibited by field recorded strong ground motions.

The power spectral density of a seismic signal can be defined as the power present in the signal as a function
of frequency. it shows at which frequencies the energy of the seismic signal is concentrated.

Since the acceleration time histories are modeled as a uniformly modulated non-stationary stochastic vector
process, the modulating function A (ω, t) is independent of the frequency w, that is:

(21)

The modulating function of a seismic signal can be seen as the intensity envelope. The functional form of
the time-domain intensity functions A(t) depends on the particular accelerogram under consideration. This
form has traditionally been associated with different characteristics such as the location and directivity of
the fault, type of rupture mechanism, crustal structure, topography, site amplification effects, etc. All these
factors have a critical influence on the propagation of seismic waves and, therefore, on the arrival at the
prediction site of the earthquake energy that the intensity function tries to represent.

Different forms of modulating functions can be used based on different references.

The modulating function proposed by Shinozuka and Sato (1967) by imposing b1<b2 is:
𝑏2 𝑏2
𝑏1
𝐴 (𝑡 ) = ( ) × 𝑒 (𝑏2−𝑏1)×ln(𝑏1) × (𝑒 −𝑏1×𝑡 − 𝑒 −𝑏2×𝑡 ) (24)
𝑏2−𝑏1

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The modulating function proposed by Iwan and Hou (1989) by imposing b1>0 and b2>0 is:

𝑏1 2
𝐴(𝑡 ) = ( ) × 𝑒 𝑏2 × 𝑡 𝑏2 × 𝑒 −𝑏1×𝑡 (23)
𝑏2

The modulating function proposed by Jennings and al. (1969) by imposing 0 < b1 < b2 is:

𝑡 2
𝐴 (𝑡 ) = ( ) 𝑡 < 𝑏1 (24)
𝑏1

𝐴 (𝑡 ) = 1 𝑏2 < 𝑡 < 𝑏1 (25)

𝐴(𝑡 ) = 𝑒 −𝑏3(𝑡−𝑏2) 𝑡 > 𝑏2 (26)

As we concluded based on the definition of an evolutionary power spectrum, Lin and Yong, Deodatis and
Shinozuka, Der Kiureghian and Crempien and Faravelli proposed models to generate a nonstationary
random process with time-varying intensity and frequency content. However, it is difficult to estimate the
parameters in these models or to implement the models in analytical random vibration analyses.

Yeh and Wen proposed in their study a new stochastic model of ground excitation. It is a modification of
the amplitude and frequency modulated random processes proposed by Grigoriu et al.

Considering a stationary random process Y(ϕ) which has the following spectral representation

(27)

where Z(w) is a random process in w and has orthogonal increments, i.e., E[dZ(w1) dZ(w2)] = 0, for all
w1≠ w2. The autocorrelation function of Y(ϕ) based on Eqn. (27) is:

which is the Fourier transform of the spectral density function.

(28)

Now let X(t)= Y (ϕ (t)) and ϕ(t) be a smooth, strictly increasing function of t. If ϕ (t) is a nonlinear function
of t, X(t) is no longer stationary because of the continuously changing time-scale effect. The
autocorrelation function of X(t) at a given time instant t can be shown to be:

(29)

13
where ϖ= ϕ'(t)ω to and ϕ'(t) = dϕ/dt. It is noted that in eqn. (29) the difference in ϕ is replaced by the time
lag τ multiplied by the first derivative of ϕ(t). This is justified for a smooth function ϕ(t) and is verified for
most earthquake ground excitations. From the definition of an instantaneous power spectrum one can see
that Eqn. (29) is the corresponding Wiener-Khintchine relationship of a nonstationary random process, and
the instantaneous power spectral density function of X(t) is:

(30)

To model the frequency content of earthquake ground motion, a Gaussian filtered white noise with a Kanai-
Tajimi or Clough-Penzien spectrum are frequently used in analytical random vibration analyses. In the
following Yeh and Wen showed how to incorporate the time-varying intensity and frequency content into
a random process with the Kanai-Tajimi or Clough-Penzien.

First they considered the random process generated by passing a Gaussian white noise ζ(t) of constant
spectral density S0 through a filter given by

(31)

The composite response ζKT(t) is stationary and has the well-known Kanai-Tajimi spectrum, which will be
denoted by SKT(w). To remove the low frequency content, one can pass the composite response through a
high pass filter:

(32)

and the resultant acceleration is also stationary and has a power spectral density and is referred to as the
Clough-Penzien spectrum SCP(ω).

By multiplying the output responses by a deterministic intensity envelope, the resulting processes are
known as uniformly (or amplitude) modulated random processes, which have been used extensively as
nonstationary random excitations.

And by Assuming the independent variable to be ϕ and introducing a time scaling function ϕ(t), by chain
the following substitutions can be made:

(33)

Equation (31) is reduced to:

(34)

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Equation (32) is reduced to:

(35)

Applying the same transformation of variables, the responses ζKT(t) and ζCP(t) are expressed in terms of t.
The spectral density function of the composite response at a given time t are given in the equations below:

(36)

(37)

The spectral density function above is then multiplied by an intensity envelope which is the modulating
function of the acceleration tine histories described here as a non-stationary random process.

To characterize the frequency content change with time, the zero crossing rate of the recorded accelerogram
is used. Assuming that the mean value of the total zero crossings of the recorded accelerogram up to time
t, denoted by μ0(t), is a continuous, differentiable and non-decreasing function of time, a functional form
for μ0 (t) is suggested by Yeh and Wen and it’s given below:

(38)

(39)

where rl, r2 and r3 are the parameters to be determined, t0 corresponds the starting time of significant
excitation, and the prime denotes the time derivative.

After understanding the simulation of samples of a one-dimensional and uni-variate Gaussian non-
stationary stochastic process through the spectral representation method and knowing that earthquake
ground motion is a nonstationary random process in which both intensity and frequency content change
with time, the power spectral density function defined by Clough-Penzien was modified to take into
consideration the frequency content of the accelerograms changing with time in addition to intensity
envelopes that that were proposed from different references and will be used in this study.

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 4- STRATEGY ADOPTED
a) Overview

The strategy adopted to generate synthetic signals was by considering that acceleration time histories are
a three dimensional and uni-variate Gaussian non-stationary stochastic process, and therefore the
simulation of the samples through the spectral representation method is performed using the following
equations (Cacciola 2012):

(40)

Where ω = l Δω and ϕl is the random phase.

The frequency step Δω is selected such as Δω ≤ min (2π/tf; 2π/200) where tf is the duration of the signal.

The duration of the signal “tf” is fixed to 15 seconds.

The cut-off angular frequency is chosen to satisfy the condition ωc0 ≤ π/dt where dt is the sampling
interval. By applying this condition, the cut off frequency is limited to the Nyquist frequency which is
the maximum frequency that will not alias given a sampling rate dt.

N= ωc0 / Δω is the number of discretization intervals in the observed frequency range.

The power spectral density function modified by “Yeh and Wen 1989” is given in the equation below

1 𝜔
𝑆(𝑡, 𝜔) = 𝐴(𝑡 )2 × × 𝑆𝑐𝑝 ( ) (41)
𝜙′ (𝑡) 𝜙′ (𝑡)

Where A(t) is the modulating function and can be seen as the intensity envelope of the seismic signals.

The modulating function used in this study is the one proposed by Iwan and Hou (1989) and is given in
the following equation by imposing b1>0 and b2>0:

𝑏1 2
𝐴(𝑡 ) = ( ) × 𝑒 𝑏2 × 𝑡 𝑏2 × 𝑒 −𝑏1×𝑡 (42)
𝑏2

b1 and b2 are coefficients to be determined in this study.

To characterize the frequency content change with time, the function ϕ(t) was introduced by Yeh and
Wen and is given in the following equation:

𝜙(𝑡) = 𝜇0(𝑡) /𝜇0’(𝑡0) (43)

μ0(t) is the mean value of the total zero crossings of the recorded accelerogram up to time t.

16
A functional form for μ0 (t) is suggested by Yeh and Wen and it’s given below:

𝜇0 (𝑡) = 𝑟1𝑡 + 𝑟2𝑡 2 + 𝑟3𝑡 3 (44)

t0 corresponds the starting time of significant excitation, and is taken as the time where the signal reach
5% of its total energy.
ϕ’(t) and μ0’(t) are the time derivative of ϕ(t) and μ0(t) respectively.
r1, r2 and r3 are parameters to be determined.

SCP represents the Clough-Penzien power spectral density function:

𝜔 2 𝜔 4
1+4𝜁𝑔2 ( ) ( )
𝜔𝑔 𝜔𝑓
𝑆𝑐𝑝(𝑤) = 2 × 2 (45)
𝜔 2 𝜔 2 𝜔 2 𝜔 2
(1−( ) ) +4𝜁𝑔2 ( ) (1−( ) ) +4𝜁𝑓2 ( )
𝜔𝑔 𝜔𝑔 𝜔𝑓 𝜔𝑓

ωg and ζg are respectively the natural frequency and damping ratio of the soil deposit.
ωf and ζf are the low band filter characteristics.
These parameters are determined shortly in the study.

SCP(ω/ϕ’(t)) is obtained by replacing “ω” with “ω/ϕ’(t)”.

After defining the different function and parameters that will be used for the generation of synthetic
accelerograms, recorded accelerograms were chosen and the parameters of each function were
determined for each one.

The work was divided into several steps to facilitate the procedure.
First, ground motions must be chosen for a selected area and a selected time period, then the available
signals are classified using different criteria.
Subsequently, the analysis of the recorded accelerograms was done by writing a code using the “Visual
Fortran” program to analyze the seismic signals chosen and get all the dynamic parameters that will be
used in the generation.
Finally, the generation of synthetic signal was done by writing a separate code using the same coding
program. This code reads the parameters recovered from the “Analysis” code and generates a set of
synthetic signals.

The different steps will be developed in what follows:

b) Ground Motions

The accelerograms that are used in this study are taken from the INGV ITACA which is the Italian
accelerometric Archive of waveforms recorded by the National Accelerometric Network and it has the
aim to provide free access to the most complete collection of records of moderate-to-severe earthquakes
occurred in Italy in the period 1972 - 2018.
Italy has experienced 125 "significant earthquakes" since 1900. Twelve of those earthquakes struck in the
past 16 years. They range from a magnitude of 3.5 in 1973 to magnitude 7.9 in 1905. At magnitude 6.2,
the earthquake on 24 August 2016 in Norcia was the eighth strongest in the region since the turn of the
last century.

17
The seismic activity map of Italy shows that Norcia is located in the region where the expected
acceleration with a 10% probability in 50 years is between 0.275-0.3 g which is the highest in the
country.

Figure 1:Risk of seismic activity across Italy (INGV)

Therefore, the accelerograms were taken from the Norcia station due to the big number of significant
earthquake that struck the region and due to its high seismicity.
The seismic signals taken from the Norcia station are restricted to an epicentral distance lower than 30km
and starting 1997.
80 signals were obtained and classified according to the magnitude, soil type, epicentral distance and
peak ground acceleration.

18
 c) Analysis of the recorded accelerograms

The analysis of the recorded accelerograms was done using the “Visual Fortran” coding program due to
the convenience of reading the input files given as text files from the Italian accelerometric Archive of
waveforms, and get the output file which is the parameters that will be used to generate signals and will
serve as an input to the “Generation code”.

At first, the different constant parameters defined earlier should be found for every chosen signal and for
its 3 component, and due to the non-linearity of the diverse functions participating in the generation
(Intensity envelop, frequency content, power spectral density), the nonlinear least square regression
method was used.

Least squares problems arise in the context of fitting a parameterized function to a set of measured data
points by minimizing the sum of the squares of the errors between the data points and the function. If the
fit function is not linear in the parameters, the least squares problem is nonlinear. The Levenberg-
Marquardt algorithm was used in this study and it combines two minimization methods: the gradient
descent method and the Gauss-Newton method. In the gradient descent method, the sum of the squared
errors is reduced by updating the parameters in the steepest-descent direction. In the Gauss-Newton
method, the sum of the squared errors is reduced by assuming the least squares function is locally
quadratic, and finding the minimum of the quadratic. The Levenberg-Marquardt method acts more like a
gradient-descent method when the parameters are far from their optimal value, and acts more like
the Gauss-Newton method when the parameters are close to their optimal value.

(for more details about the Levenberg-Marquardt algorithm it is recommended to read appendix 1)

The Levenberg-Marquardt algorithm was written as a subroutine in Visual Fortran that can be called
similar to a function due to its several usages in this study.

i. Modulating Function

Starting with the modulating function also known as the intensity envelop, 2 parameters b1 and b2 were
to be determined from the equation of Iwan and Hou (1989).

To estimate the required parameters and time-varying modulation function of the proposed ground
motions, the following procedure is used:
The expected energy function of ground excitation at time t of the acceleration time history which is
known by the Husid function is given by:
𝑡 𝑡
𝐻𝑢(𝑡) = ∫0 𝑎𝑔2 (𝑡) 𝑑𝑡 = ∫0 𝐴2 (𝑡) 𝑑𝑡 (46)

where ag(t) is the recorded acceleration time history.

A(t) is the modulating function or the intensity envelop defined earlier.

By using the cumulative normalized Husid function we can obtain a strictly increasing function which
will be easier to use in the nonlinear least square regression to estimate the parameters b1 and b2.
After fitting the cumulative energy function of the recorded accelerograms with the cumulative energy
function of the intensity envelop, the parameters b1 and b2 were obtained for each signal and for each
component to be saved as an output to the programed code.

19
To verify the compatibility of the modulating function with the actual signal by using the fitted
parameters, the absolute value of the accelerogram was plotted against the modulating function for every
signal, in addition to the cumulative normalized Husid function that was used to obtain the parameters.
but due to the big number of chosen signals the comparison will be shown for 2 signals in the figures
below:

Sample signal 1 Sample signal 2

North

East

Vertical

Figure 2 : Modulating function compared with the Absolute value of the acceleration time history

20
 Sample Signal 1 Sample signal 2

North

East

Vertical

Figure 3: Cumulative normalized Husid integral of recorded signals compared with calculated ones for 2 sample signals

Its visible from the 2 samples of signals above that if the fitted parameters found from the nonlinear least
square regression are used in the equation of Iwan Hou 1989, the absolute value of the signal is contained
inside the modulating function known as the intensity envelop as well as the compatibility of the
Cumulative normalized Husid function using the fitted parameters and the one calculated using the real
signal.
The parameters b1 and b2 are found for every signal and stored in an output file to be used in the next
steps of our work.

21
 ii. Zero Crossing Function

To characterize the frequency content change with time the function ϕ(t) introduced by Yeh and Wen
depends on the function μ0(t) which is the mean value of the total positive zero crossings of the recorded
accelerogram up to time t.
The coefficients r1, r2, and r3 are found using the nonlinear least square regression as done earlier due to
the functional form of the function μ0(t) which is a 3rd degree polynomial function as suggested earlier.
After obtaining the fitted parameters ri a comparison was made between the positive zero crossings of the
recorded accelerogram up to time t and the function μ0(t) obtained with the fitted coefficients.
The comparison is demonstrated using 2 sample signals and its shown in the figure below:

Sample signal 1 Sample signal 2

North

East

Vertical

Figure 4 : fitted Positive zero crossing rate compared with the calculated ones for 2 sample signals

22
By observing the positive zero crossing rate obtained by replacing the μ0(t) equation with the fitted
parameters obtained by the nonlinear least square regression and comparing it with the actual positive
zero crossing rate of the 2 sample signals used above we can see a good compatibility between the 2
plots.
The parameters r1, r2 and r3 are found for every signal and stored in an output file to be used in the next
steps of our work.

iii. Power Spectral Density Function

The power spectral density function used in this study and defined by Clough-Penzien depends on the
angular frequency ω which varies between 0 and the cut off frequency ωc0, and on several parameters that
should be determined for each signal.
Similar to the modulating function and the Zero crossing function, the power spectral density function
parameters were found using the nonlinear least square regression.

To estimate the required parameters and frequency-varying power spectral density function of the chosen
ground motions, the following procedure is used:

The total Intensity or energy I0 of a Ground Motion a(t) of Duration tf in time domain given by:

𝑡𝑓
𝐼𝑜 = ∫0 𝑎2 (𝑡 ) 𝑑𝑡 (47)

In frequency domain, I0 is given by:

1 𝜔𝑁
𝐼𝑜 = ∫0 𝑐 2 (𝜔) 𝑑𝜔 (48)
𝜋

where c(ω) is the Fourier amplitude spectrum and ωN= π/dt is the Nyquist frequency.

𝑡𝑓
𝐹(𝜔) = 𝐹𝐹𝑇 ( 𝑎(𝑡)) = ∫0 𝑎(𝑡)𝑒 −𝑖𝜔𝑡 𝑑𝑡 (49)

𝑐(𝜔) = √𝑅𝑒 2 (𝐹(𝜔)) + 𝐼𝑚2 (𝐹(𝑤) (50)

Parseval’s theorem can show that (1) and (2) are equal. The average intensity or mean squared
acceleration λ0 is given by dividing (1) or (2) by the duration tf :

1 𝑡𝑓 1 𝜔𝑁
𝜆𝑜 = ∫ 𝑎2 (𝑡 ) 𝑑𝑡 =
𝑡𝑓 0 𝜋 𝑡𝑓
∫0 𝑐 2 (𝜔) 𝑑𝜔 (51)

The average intensity can be also calculated using the power spectral density S(ω)

𝜔𝑁
𝜆𝑜 = ∫0 𝑆(𝜔) 𝑑𝜔 (52)

From the equation (51) and (52), S(ω) can be written as follows:

𝑐 2 (𝜔)
𝑆(𝜔) = (53)
𝜋 𝑡𝑓

23
This equality between the power spectral density function and the Fourier amplitude spectrum of each
signal will be used in the nonlinear least square regression to obtained the parameters ωg, ζg, ωf and ζf
for each seismic signal.
The Comparison of the power spectral density function is given in the figure below:

Acc17 Power spectral density Acc25 Power spectral density

North

East

Vertical

Figure 5 : Fitted power spectral density function compared with the calculated one for 2 sample signals

24
By comparing the power spectral density function calculated for the 2 sample signals using equation ()
and the one obtained using the fitted parameters found using the least square regression, it’s well
observed that they are compatible to a certain point due the difficulty of finding a nonlinear function with
that much oscillation.

iv. Output of the Analysis

After obtaining the dynamic parameters of each seismic signal as developed earlier, the normalized
cumulative probability distribution of each parameter was calculated, in addition to the probabilistic
properties of each one to be used to calculate in the correlation matrix that will take a big part in the
generation of synthetic signals

The statistical properties calculated for each parameter are given below:

1
1) The Mean value 𝜇(𝑥) = ∑ 𝑥𝑖
𝑁

1
2) The variance 𝑉𝑎𝑟(𝑥) = ∑(𝑥𝑖 − 𝑥̄ )2
𝑁

1
3) The covariance 𝐶𝑜𝑣 (𝑥, 𝑦) = ∑(𝑥𝑖 − 𝑥̄ ) (𝑦𝑖 − ȳ)
𝑁

𝐶𝑜𝑣(𝑥,𝑦)2
4) The correlation 𝐶𝑜𝑟𝑟(𝑥, 𝑦) = √
𝑉𝑎𝑟(𝑥) 𝑉𝑎𝑟(𝑦)

After calculating the statistical properties above for each component of the different parameters, they are
stored in a text file and will serve as an input to the generation code.

The Normalized cumulative probability distribution of each dynamic parameter was calculated and
stored as well in a text file to serve as an input to the generation code.
The results are shown below:

- Modulating function parameters

Figure 6:Normalized cumulative probability density function of the modulating function parameters

25
 (a) Zero crossing rate parameters (b) Power spectral density function parameters

Figure 7: Normalized cumulative probability density function

(a) Zero crossing rate function parameters, (b) Power spectral density function parameters

26
The Statistical Properties of each parameter are given below:

- Modulating function parameters

Table 1 : Statistical properties of the modulating function parameters

av_x av_y av_z var_x var_y var_z cov_xy cov_xz cov_yz corr_xy corr_xz corr_yz
b1 1.39 1.24 1.05 1.48 1.58 0.79 1.23 0.97 0.75 0.81 0.89 0.67

b2 29.92 27.07 21.87 879.51 701.61 536.60 651.44 621.84 417.57 0.83 0.91 0.68

- Zero Crossing rate function parameters

Table 2: Statistical properties of the zero crossing function parameters

av_x av_y av_z var_x var_y var_z cov_xy cov_xz cov_yz corr_xy corr_xz corr_yz

r1 18.757 17.7482 17.4478 131.319 104.222 78.9992 115.029 95.1812 86.6919 0.983252 0.93449 0.9554

r2 -0.38676 -0.35381 -0.32785 0.156354 0.11942 0.107798 0.134284 0.124875 0.111671 0.982713 0.96187 0.9842

r3 0.003282 0.00285 0.002646 2.60E-05 1.81E-05 1.58E-05 2.14E-05 1.98E-05 1.68E-05 0.988325 0.97775 0.9937

- Power spectral density function parameters

Table 3: Statistical properties of the power spectral density function parameters

av_x av_y av_z var_x var_y var_z cov_xy cov_xz cov_yz corr_xy corr_xz corr_yz

wg 0.01925 0.0164 0.01431 0.00074 0.00033 0.000206 0.00038 0.0003 0.00021 0.77386 0.74427 0.8148

wf 15.931 12.983 14.8533 129.154 83.8568 22.1445 81.3916 39.894 31.5159 0.78209 0.74597 0.7314

zg 0.8088 0.8566 0.90083 0.74105 0.4553 0.897781 0.232471 0.3607 0.09665 0.40022 0.44217 0.1512

zf 0.8088 0.8566 0.90083 0.74105 0.4553 0.897781 0.232471 0.3607 0.09665 0.40022 0.44217 0.1512

27
 d) Generation of synthetic seismic signals

The generation of synthetic signals was done using the “Visual Fortran” program. The output of the
analysis which is the normalized cumulative probability density function and the correlation coefficients
will serve as an input to the generation.
The equations used to generate 3 components of a synthetic signal obtained using the spectral
representation method are remembered in the equations below:

Where ω = l Δω and ϕl is the random phase.

The function S (ω, t) depends on several constant parameters, and for every generated signal and for every
component of the motion, a set of these coefficients must be determined.
The following procedure is used:

The same procedure is used for all the dynamic parameters but will only be explained for the coefficient
bi of the modulating function.
Each coefficient bi was determined for each signal chosen and for each component of the motion, but the
components were uncorrelated, but should be correlated using the equation below:

bi = LiT vi (54)

vi = [ vi x, vi y, vi z ] is a vector of uncorrelated variables determined for three motion components.

LiT is the transpose of Cholesky decomposition of the correlation matrix Cbi of the variable bi.

Cbi = LiT Li (55)

Having the normalized Cpdf of each parameter as an input to the generation code, the uncorrelated
variables vi can be determined by generating a random number between 0 and 1 serving as a value for the
cpdf (y-axis) and obtaining its relative value which is the parameter’s value (x-axis).

The procedure is repeated for each component of the variable and the vector vi is obtained.
The vector μi is obtained from the probabilistic properties transferred from the Analysis code.

The Correlation matrix is a function of the variance, and the correlation of the parameter taken into
consideration.
The correlation matrix shifted to zero mean is defined as

28
𝐶𝑏𝑖 = (𝟓𝟔)

Cbi = LiT Li

The transpose of the Cholesky decomposition of the correlation matrix Cbi is given below

(57)

Where ρ is the cross correlation and σ represents the variance of the parameter taken into consideration.

A random phase ϕl, uniformly distributed between 0 and 2, is generated and the same value
is applied for the three components of seismic motion.

29
 5- RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS
After applying the above detailed procedure, a set of synthetic seismic signals. 2 sample signals are taken
and are shown in the figures below:

 Seismic Signal 1

(a) Horizontal (North) component

(b) Horizontal (East) component

30
(c) Vertical Component

Figure 8 : Acceleration time histories of a generated 3 dimensional seismic signal :

(a) North (b) East (c) Vertical

 Seismic Signal 2

(a) Horizontal (North) component

31
(b) Horizontal (East) Component

(c) Vertical component

Figure 9: Acceleration time history of a generated 3 dimensional seismic signal :

(a) North (b) East (c) Vertical

32
After obtaining the results of the generation of several seismic signals a comparison with the target
spectrum is done.
First, the marginal distributions of the seismic signals are defined in the equations below:

(58)

(59)

According to Cacciola The equations above should be compared respectively with the ensemble average
of the squared samples E[ag(t)] and with the ensemble average of the squared Fourier transform E[c(ω)].

Where c(w) is the Fourier transform of the signal ag(t).

The comparison is shown below for the three directions and it indicates the excellent agreement between
the simulated and the target ones.

33
Average Spectral Moment Average Power spectral density

Figure 10 : Target spectrum comparison

34
 6- CONCLUSION
From this study it can be concluded that:

 Synthetic strong motion ground acceleration-time histories can be generated using the power
spectral densities that are function angular frequency, an intensity envelope function and
frequency content function.

 Although this artificially generated accelerograms are simply simulations of acceleration-time

histories based on parameters defined using the least square regression, nevertheless, they are
acceptable to be adopted as the ground acceleration time history.

 The generated signals can serve as input to the time history analysis procedure, that will give
detailed seismic response of the structure studied but can only be useful in the studied location
which is in our case the region around Norcia.

 This procedure can be upgraded to take into consideration every location studied. This way
building codes will have synthetic signals that depends on the seismicity of the zone studied, and
the type of soil similar to the response spectrum but the change in frequency overtime is a big
problem considering that it depends on the depth of the earthquake.

35
APPENDIX 1
In fitting a function ŷ (t; p) of an independent variable t and a vector of n parameters p to a set of m data
points (ti, yi), it is customary and convenient to minimize the sum of the weighted squares of the errors
(or weighted residuals) between the measured data yi and the curve-fit function ŷ (t; p). This scalar-
valued goodness-of-fit measure is called the chi-squared error criterion because the sum of squares of
normally-distributed variables is distributed as the chi-squared distribution.

where σyi is the measurement error for measurement y(ti). Typically, the weighting matrix Wii is diagonal
with Wii = 1/σ2yi. More formally, Wii can be set to the inverse of the measurement error covariance
matrix, in the unusual case that it is known. More generally, the weights Wii, can be set to pursue other
curve-fitting goals.

If the function ŷ (t; p) is nonlinear in the model parameters p, then the minimization of χ2 with respect to
the parameters must be carried out iteratively. The goal of each iteration is to find a perturbation h to the
parameters p that reduces χ2.

 The Gradient Descent Method

The steepest descent method is a general minimization method which updates parameter values in the
“downhill” direction: the direction opposite to the gradient of the objective function. The gradient
descent method converges well for problems with simple objective functions [6, 7]. For problems with
thousands of parameters, gradient descent methods are sometimes the only viable choice.

The gradient of the chi-squared objective function with respect to the parameters is :

where the m × n Jacobian matrix [∂ŷ/∂p] represents the local sensitivity of the function ŷ to variation in
the parameters p. Note that in models that are linear in the parameters, ŷ= Xp, the Jacobian [∂ŷ/∂p] is the
matrix of model basis vectors X. For notational simplicity the variable J will be used for [∂ŷ/∂p]. The
parameter update h that moves the parameters in the direction of steepest descent is given by

where the positive scalar α determines the length of the step in the steepest-descent direction.

36
  The Gauss-Newton Method

The Gauss-Newton method is a method for minimizing a sum-of-squares objective function. It presumes
that the objective function is approximately quadratic in the parameters near the optimal solution [2]. For
moderately-sized problems the Gauss-Newton method typically converges much faster than gradient-
descent methods [8].
The function evaluated with perturbed model parameters may be locally approximated through a first-
order Taylor series expansion.

Substituting the approximation ŷ (p + h) ≈ ŷ (p) + J h into equation (3) for χ2 (p + h),

The first-order Taylor approximation (8) results in an approximation for χ2 that is quadratic in the
perturbation h. The Hessian of the chi-squared fit criterion is approximately J TW J.

The parameter update h that minimizes χ2 is found from ∂χ2/∂h = 0:

and the resulting normal equations for the Gauss-Newton update are

 The Levenberg-Marquardt Method

The Levenberg-Marquardt algorithm adaptively varies the parameter updates between

the gradient descent update and the Gauss-Newton update,

where small values of the damping parameter λ result in a Gauss-Newton update and large values of λ
result in a gradient descent update. The damping parameter λ is initialized to be large so that first updates
are small steps in the steepest-descent direction. If any iteration happens to result in a worse
approximation (χ2(p + hlm) > χ2(p)), then λ is increased. Otherwise, as the solution improves, λ is
decreased, the Levenberg-Marquardt method approaches the Gauss-Newton method, and the solution
typically accelerates to the local minimum [6, 7, 8].

In Marquardt’s update relationship [8]

the values of λ are normalized to the values of JT W J.

37
REFERENCES

- George Deodatis (1996). Non-stationary stochastic vector processes: seismic ground motion
applications.

- Pierfrancesco Cacciola (2012). Simulation of high variable random processes through the spectral
representation-based approach.

- C.H. Yeh and Y.K. Wen (1990). Modeling of nonstationary ground motion and analysis of
inelastic structural response.

- Shun-Hao Ni, Wei-Chau Xie, Mahesh D. Pandey (2011). Tri-directional spectrum-compatible

earthquake time-histories for nuclear energy facilities.

- S. Trovato, E. D'Amore, Q. Yue, P.D. Spanos (2017). An approach for synthesizing tri-
component ground motions compatible with hazard-consistent target spectrum - Italian aseismic
code application.

- Henri P. Gavin (2019). The Levenberg-Marquardt algorithm for nonlinear least squares curve-
fitting problems.

- Agathoklis Giaralis and Pol D. Spanos (2012). Derivation of response spectrum compatible non-
stationary stochastic processes relying on Monte Carlo-based peak factor estimation.

- J. A. Abdalla1 & Y. M. Hag-Elhassan (2005) Simulation of earthquake ground motion for

generation of artificial accelerograms.

- Liangcai He (2004), Geotechnical Earthquake Engineering.

- Rajesh Rupakhety and Ragnar Sigbjornson (2014). Three dimensional characteristics of strong
motions in the near fault area.

38