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Introduction
Dr Qu is a professor at the Institute of Engineering Mechanics, China Earthquake Administration. His research interest is in reducing economic and functional loss of buildings under earthquakes by controlling the seismic damage to structural and non-structural components. His academic awards in recent years include the Outstanding Young Engineers' Contribution Award by IABSE in 2015 and the AIJ Book Award by Architectural Institute of Japan in 2018.
Additional affiliations
December 2012 - December 2016
August 2010 - December 2012
Education
September 2007 - July 2010
September 2005 - August 2007
August 2001 - August 2005
Publications
Publications (123)
The displacement response of a building structure to earthquake excitations is crucial for assessing its seismic damage, which is usually accompanied by structural nonlinear behavior. This study proposes an efficient method of quickly estimating the nonlinear displacement responses of seismically damaged buildings. By designing a set of sparsely an...
Seismic base isolation faces the challenge of the large displacement demands for the isolators in case of long-period ground motions. Semi-active control has the potential to mitigate the risk against such extreme scenarios and therefore increase the seismic reliability of base-isolated structures. However, the superstructural nonlinearity and the...
This paper presents full‐scale experimental tests on the seismic behavior of a stone curtain wall system with undercut bolt anchorage (SCWS‐UBA). Experimental set‐ups were developed to test full‐scale stone curtain wall systems subjected to three loading protocols: quasi‐static in‐plane loading, dynamic in‐plane loading, and dynamic coupled in‐plan...
Base isolation is among the most effective techniques for safeguarding buildings against earthquakes. Similar to non-isolated buildings, the seismic performance of a base-isolated building can vary not only due to the inherent record-to-record variability in earthquake ground motions but also the non-negligible influence of uncertainties associated...
This link contains the full paper, dataset, and the program code
Damage identification in post-earthquake reinforced concrete (RC) structures based on semantic segmentation has been recognized as a promising approach for rapid and non-contact damage localization and quantification. In damage segmentation tasks, damage regions are often set against complex backgrounds, featuring irregular geometric boundaries and...
The seismic performance of nonstructural elements is crucial for buildings to remain functional during and after earthquakes. Since the seismic damage to many nonstructural elements is sensitive to their acceleration and/or velocity responses, dynamic testing becomes inevitable in assessing their seismic performance. We propose a novel experimental...
Buckling-restrained braces (BRBs) are intended to protect the primary structure of buildings by absorbing most earthquake input energy through the plastic deformation of the steel cores. The ultra-low-cycle fatigue performance of BRBs is crucial for their seismic performance as energy dissipators. Despite the plenty of research on the ultra-low-cyc...
Nonstructural damage, usually predominates in buildings subjected to low to moderate seismic intensities and contributes significantly to business interruption and economic losses. It promotes a rapidly growing need for experimental research and qualification of various types of nonstructural elements in buildings in the recent decades. To provide...
Seismic intensity measures (IMs) quantify the severity of ground motions and their impacts on structures. We propose a novel method for constructing effective vector-valued IMs from a set of candidate scalar ones, by utilizing machine learning to map scalar IMs to engineering demand parameters and iteratively eliminating less important ones. The pr...
Displacement control algorithms commonly used to evaluate axial force-bending moment (PM) diagrams may lead to incorrect interpretations of the strength envelop for asymmetric sections. This paper aims to offer valuable insights by comparing existing displacement control algorithms with a newly proposed force control algorithm. The main focus is on...
This paper investigates the seismic behavior of a glass curtain wall system under various loading scenarios. Experimental set‐ups and approaches were developed to test full‐scale fully tempered (FT) insulating glass curtain wall systems subjected to three loading protocols: quasi‐static in‐plane loading, dynamic in‐plane loading, and dynamic couple...
The kinked rebar configuration proposed by the authors has previously demonstrated improved seismic performance and progressive collapse resistance through quasi-static tests on reinforced concrete (RC) beams and plane RC frame substructures. In this paper, shaking table tests were conducted to evaluate the seismic performance of the novel RC frame...
Estimating seismic demands and the associated damage to nonstructural components (NSCs) is a critical step in the performance-based earthquake engineering (PBEE) framework. To facilitate this type of assessment, NSCs are classified as being acceleration, velocity, or displacement sensitive. When two-dimensional structural models and response histor...
This study proposes a new arrangement-tuning method to maximize the potential of tuned mass dampers (TMDs) in decreasing the seismic responses of tall buildings. The method relies on a Grammian-based entropy index with the physical meaning of covariance responses to white noise without the involvement of external inputs. A twelve-story RC frame-she...
A realistic and practical damping model is essential for structural dynamics. In this study, the second-order accurate time discretization of a high-performance uniform damping model for response history analysis is derived. Its stability and accuracy are proven, and its object-oriented implementation is introduced in OpenSees. The proposed time di...
To enable the experimental assessment of the seismic performance of full-scale nonstructural elements with multiple engineering parameters (EDPs), a three-layer testbed named Nonstructural Element Simulator on Shake Table (NEST) has been developed. The testbed consists of three consecutive floors of steel structure. The bottom two floors provide a...
The seismic performance of medical systems is crucial for the seismic resilience of communities. The report summarizes the observed damage to twelve hospital buildings in the area affected by the MW7.8 and MW7.5 earthquakes on 6 February 2023 in Turkey. They include five base-isolated buildings and seven fixed-base buildings in southcentral Turkey'...
Seismic base isolation performs well in protecting the drift-and acceleration-sensitive elements in buildings, while its effectiveness in reducing the velocity response and thus protecting velocity-sensitive elements remains unclear. Through laboratory tests and numerical simulations, this paper shows that base isolation does not adequately control...
Pin-supported (PS) walls have been proven effective in avoiding weak story failure of frame structures by increasing the height-wise continuous stiffness and producing uniform distribution of story drifts. However, little attention has been given to the floor velocity or acceleration responses of PS wall-frame structures, which predominate the seis...
Accurate measurements of inter-story drift responses are critical in shaking table tests. This paper compared three commonly-used approaches of inter-story drift measurement, and developed the techniques for enhanced measurement. This study proposed a novel arrangement of displacement meters along with the associated data correction method. By sett...
Seismic damage to suspended ceilings was frequently reported even in minor to moderate earthquakes and caused problems to immediate occupancy and quick recovery of buildings. While peak floor acceleration (PFA) has been exclusively used as an intensity measure for suspended ceilings, this study introduces a shake table test on minimum subassemblies...
Experimental testing is a primary approach to understanding the seismic performance of nonstructural elements, the damage to which may claim tremendous loss during earthquakes. This paper proposed a standard dynamic loading protocol for experiments on acceleration-sensitive non-structural elements. It is described by closed-form equations and match...
A tuned mass damper (TMD) on top flexible structures may sustain considerable rotation because of the significant flexural deformation of the supporting structure. The effects of such rotation on the vibration reduction performance are generally neglected in the analysis and design of TMD-controlled systems, by assuming that the mass moves only lat...
During the M6.8 Luding earthquake in Sichuan Province, China, on September 5, 2022, a 4-story base-isolated building near the epicenter sustained extensive damage to its lead rubber bearings, sewage pipes in the isolation layer, and the nonstructural elements of the isolation joint, while its superstructure successfully slid on the isolation layer...
During the M6.8 Luding earthquake in Sichuan Province, China, on September 5, 2022, a multi-story base-isolated building near the epicenter sustained extensive damage to its viscous dampers in the isolation layer, the pipelines crossing the isolation gap, and the nonstructural elements of the isolation joint. Following an introduction to the typica...
The report summarizes the observed damage to a variety of buildings near the epicenter of the M6.8 Luding earthquake in Sichuan Province, China. They include base-isolated buildings, multi-story reinforced concrete (RC) frame buildings, and masonry buildings. The near-field region is known to be tectonically highly active, and the local intensity l...
In a conventional base isolation system, minimizing the seismic responses of the superstructure is always at the cost of increasing the isolator's response. The semi-active control of the isolator has been considered an effective solution to such a dilemma. It tunes the real-time properties of the isolator according to preset rules to further reduc...
This paper presents a single-degree-of-freedom (SDOF) constitutive model for assessing the performance of freestanding block contents of buildings. The model incorporates a bespoke damper to account for energy dissipation associated with rocking. It is advantageous in its direct correlation, via energy conservation, to the restitution coeffi cient...
Earthquakes cause serious damage to buildings and result in heavy losses to society, therefore, it is necessary to enhance the seismic capacity of existing buildings via structural retrofitting. The traditional retrofitting approaches are based on the component-level, but their improvement effect for the overall structure is not obvious. The ultima...
Non-Asbestos Organic (NAO) is widely used in automobile braking systems due to its low cost and stable performance. Meanwhile, NAO is also suitable for seismic energy dissipation of building structures, but further research was required. Configuration and loading rate are significant factors affecting the hysteretic performance of the friction damp...
In a passive-controlled structure for seismic protection, energy dissipating devices such as steel dampers are supposed to concentrate earthquake energy dissipation and to sustain strain amplitudes and strain rates much larger than those in primary structural elements. The self-heating and the moderate strain rate in the order of magnitude of 1 s⁻¹...
The design of acceleration-sensitive nonstructural elements is closely related to the peak floor acceleration (PFA) responses. We propose an improved method for estimating PFAs in buildings during earthquakes. This introduces a complementary mode accounting for the ground accelerations properly. It is equally practical as conventional response spec...
The M6.4 Yangbi earthquake on May 21, 2021 was another devastating earthquake (M>6) in Yunan province after seven years since the 2014 M6.5 Ludian earthquake and M6.6 Jinggu earthquake. Despite their similar magnitudes, focal depths and source mechanisms, the Yangbi and Ludian earthquakes produced ground motions near the epicenters of very differen...
Lightly reinforced concrete (LRC) walls have been widely used in reinforced concrete (RC) buildings in Japan as partitions and enclosure walls. Despite their contributions of considerable strength and stiffness to the structural system, they are generally classified as nonstructural elements and are not considered in seismic design. In recent decad...
Out-of-plane collapse is one of the most important failure modes for masonry infill walls in frame structures during earthquakes and may result in significant economic loss, blocked evacuation pathways and even injuries and fatalities. To investigate the effect of prior in-plane damage on the out-of-plane behavior of masonry infill walls, a series...
This paper proposes an algorithm for express solutions in nonlinear structural dynamics. Our strategy is to adopt a typical time integrator and accept the solution after a constant number of iterations using a constant Jacobian matrix. Its success may not be initially obvious, but we demonstrate that the proposed algorithm not only is fully operati...
We subjected nine full-scale masonry infilled reinforced concrete frame specimens to quasi-static cyclic loading to critically review the methods for determining the damage state of masonry infill walls to develop reliable in-plane fragility functions. Among the three methods, the method based on maximum crack widths gave the smallest dispersion, w...
Criteria are proposed for determining the stiffness and strength demands for the seismic design of pin-supported walls in low-and medium-rise reinforced-concrete moment frames. A plasticity ratio and a global stiffness ratio are introduced to evaluate the effect of pin-supported walls (PS walls) in mobilizing the seismic capacity of the moment fram...
A community’s resilience relies on the resilience of its infrastructure systems and the many individual buildings that form the built environment. In evaluating the resilience of an individual building, it is fundamental to quantitatively define its functionality. In this paper, the functionality and its variation of a seismically based-isolated bu...
The Chuandou timber frame is a traditional timber structural system widely used for nonengineered residential houses in southwestern China; this system is featured by beam-to-column joints with direct penetration tenons and free-standing column bases. As concluded by a previous study, the Chuandou timber frames with proper infills have exhibited be...
In coupled wall systems, coupling beams distributed along the structural height are intended to yield and dissipate seismic energy under moderate and severe earthquakes. The use of specifically designed dampers in coupling beams can greatly enhance the seismic performance of a structure. In the present study, a friction damper incorporating brake p...
Two groups of geometrically identical buckling-restrained braces (BRBs) were subjected to either dynamic or quasi-static uniaxial loading until the cores fractured to investigate the effect of the strain rate on the hysteretic behavior of BRBs. The test results show that the compression overstrength of the BRBs is significantly greater in dynamic l...
In this paper, it is proposed to use an unconstrained gusset plate and a hinge relocation technique to control the damage to RC beam-column joints. The structural behavior of RC beams with BRB connections and relocated plastic hinges is investigated by cyclic loading tests. In the tests on RC beams with BRB connections, the BRB axial force was simu...
In external retrofitting where a new structure is attached to the façade of an existing building, the connection between the two structures is critical for the seismic performance of the retrofitted building. Following a previous study that introduced a precast prestressed concrete frame system with mild press joints (PC-MPJ) for external seismic r...
Rayleigh damping model suggests high physical damping at high frequency. This is considered to be desirable to filter the inaccurate high-frequency responses in numerical transient analysis. However, with some widely adopted time integrators, the simulated system shows unexpected oscillation as if no damping is in effect. This paper presents an inv...
A precast prestressed concrete frame system with mild press joints is introduced for the seismic retrofit of existing reinforced concrete frames. Cyclic loading tests are conducted on precast prestressed concrete and cast-in-situ reinforced concrete frame subassemblies to investigate the hysteretic behavior and damage characteristics of the frames....
The fishbone model is a simplified numerical model for moment-resisting frames that is capable of modelling the effects of column-beam strength and stiffness ratios. The applicability of the fishbone model in simulating the seismic responses of reinforced concrete moment-resisting frames of different sets of column-beam strength and stiffness ratio...
It is widely accepted that ductility design improves the seismic capacity of structures worldwide. Nevertheless, inelastic deformation allows serious damage to occur in structures. Previous studies have shown that a certain level of postyield stiffness may reduce both the peak displacement and residual deformation of a structure. In recent years, s...
The seismic behavior of a school gymnasium, whose steel grid roof was heavily damaged during the Mw6.6 Lushan earthquake in 2013, is simulated through nonlinear dynamic analysis. The simulated damage is compared with field observations to validate the numerical model, based on which a parametric study was performed to provide insight into the failu...
The experimental research on the seismic performance of non-structural components in China is still very limited. Following an introduction to the loading protocol of the Non-structural Component Simulator at the State University of New York at Buffalo (UB-NCS), this paper proposes to obtain the height-wise distributions of peak floor acceleration...
This report presents studies on the construction performance of connecting buckling restrained braces in RC frames and the decrease in the tension of anchor PC rods. First, a construction test considering actual building conditions was carried out. From the test result, problems in actual construction were identified and the possible solutions were...
In the mid‐18th century, Great Britain gave birth to the Industrial Revolution. The modern era started in Europe where there were no severe natural disasters caused by earthquakes. By the 19th century, the industrial movement had swept into Asia. In 1868, Japan began importing science and technology from Europe and USA. Subsequently, Japan's civili...
In modern society, the population, wealth and social functions are increasingly concentrated in a few large cities. Such concentration brings about efficiency while at the same time it increases the vulnerability of the society. To address this issue, the Science Council of Japan (SCJ) published a proposal entitled “Shape Cities and Societies Safer...
The existing design code has strict requirements for the seismic design of building structures, with little focus on the nonstructural components in buildings. Buildings may lose the function because of the damage to nonstructural components even though the structural damage is slight. As a type of typical nonstructural components, pipelines are of...
The damage to the masonry-infilled reinforced concrete (RC) frame buildings in Charikot, the capital city of Dolakha district in Nepal, during the 2015 April-to-May Nepal earthquake sequence, is reported. Most of these buildings were built by the owners with little governmental inspections regarding their structural design or constructional quality...
Civil engineering works such as buildings and infrastructure are the carriers of human civilization. They are, however, also the origins of various types of disasters, which are referred to in this paper as civil engineering disasters. This paper presents the concept of civil engineering disasters, their characteristics, classification, causes, and...
The reinforced concrete (RC) shear wall serves as one of the most important components sustaining lateral seismic forces. Although they allow advanced seismic performance to be achieved, RC shear walls are rather difficult to repair once the physical plastic hinge at the bottom part has been formed. To overcome this, a damage-controllable plastic h...
S. He Zhe Qu Huimeng Zhou- [...]
D. Wang
With the increasing complexity of modern building functions and diversity of nonstructural components, seismic damage to nonstructural components may result in disruption of building functions and lead to huge economic losses. Conventional quasi-static, dynamic and shake table testing methods for structural experiments are also used for non-structu...
In this paper, the structural behavior of reinforced concrete (RC) beams with connections for buckling restrained braces (BRBs) and relocated plastic hinges is investigated by cyclic loading tests and finite element analysis. In the tests on the RC beams with BRB connections, the BRB axial force was simulated by a force-controlled actuator. Two dif...
To study the seismic performance of a new concrete filled tube-confined sandwich shear wall (CFT-SSW), cyclic loading tests were carried out on three CFT-SSW specimens with different depth-thickness ratios and one conventional concrete shear wall specimen for comparison. The load-carrying capacity, ductility, stiffness and their degradation, hyster...
Although the unbalanced brace force at the mid-length of columns discourages the use of K- or double K-bracing in concentrically braced frames, this limitation needs re-evaluation when K- or double K-bracing is implemented in buckling restrained braced frames. Unlike ordinary steel braces, buckling restrained braces (BRBs) exhibit almost identical...
Cities are syntheses of many individual buildings and infrastructures that support the function of the built environment. Current seismic design strategies focus on individual buildings, including the safety of their occupants, operation of the business they host, and the economic loss they may bring about to their owners if they are damaged during...
A half-month seismic reconnaissance survey has been conducted two months after Nepal Ms. 8.1 earthquake. This paper reports the seismic hazards observed in reinforcement concrete (RC) frame structures at three sites. Only a few important RC frame buildings are anti-earthquake designed, such as hospitals, government buildings and schools, while the...
Although many efforts have been taken in the past years to study the near-fault ground motion observation and its effects on the seismic responses of building structures, the number of near-fault pulse-like ground motion records in mainland China is still very limited. The Mw6.3 Ludian earthquake in 2014 caused high fatality and severe building dam...
A steel coupling beam equipped with a friction damper in the mid span is proposed for the use in high-rise buildings. Damage is only likely to take place on the brake pad-to-steel friction interface while the other parts of the steel coupling beam are expected to remain elastic under major earthquakes. High-strength bolts and disc springs are place...
Based on the experimental results of various types of buckling restrained braces (BRBs) in the literature, equations of estimating the two over-strength factors of BRBs, namely the strain-hardening factor and the compressive over-strength factor, were proposed. A series of cyclic loading tests of BRBs made of Q235 steel were conducted. The effects...
Civil engineering is the carrier of human civilization. It is also the carrier of various kinds of disasters that are defined as the civil engineering disasters in this paper. The paper presents the concept of civil engineering disaster, its characteristics, classification, causes and mitigation technologies. The civil engineering disaster is cause...
Severe damage to suspended ceilings of metal grids and lay-in panels was observed in public buildings during the 2013 M
s7.0 Lushan earthquake in China. Over the past several years, suspended ceilings have been widely used practice in public buildings throughout China, including government offices, schools and hospitals. To investigate the damage m...
In this paper, the seismic response control of BRBs in super high-rise RC buildings subjected to earthquake ground motions is investigated by nonlinear time history analysis. The analysis model is a 36 stories super high-rise RC building. A bare frame structure is used as a reference model. The parameter of the analysis was the configuration of the...
A new buckling restrained braced frame system was proposed in a previous study for reinforced concrete frames, which was featured by the zigzag configuration of buckling restrained braces to ease the steel-to-concrete connection. Experimental tests were conducted to establish realistic numerical models of the brace connections in the proposed syste...
An unconstrained gusset connection for buckling restrained braces in reinforced concrete frame structures is proposed and tested as an effort to mitigate the complicated and usually harmful interactions between the steel gusset plate and the adjoining reinforced concrete column. Local damage control incorporating the rearrangement of beam flexural...
An unconstrained gusset connection is proposed for buckling restrained braces in reinforced concrete frame structures in order to eliminate the detrimental frame action because of the interaction between the gusset plate and the adjoining reinforced concrete columns and beams, which may impair both the connection performance and the aseismic perfor...