The Earthquake Engineering Online Archive - (Nisee e-library)

Stochastic finite element methods and reliability: a state-of-the-art report

Sudret, Bruno; Der Kiureghian, Armen

UCB/SEMM-2000/08, Dept. of Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of California, Berkeley, 2000, 179 pages

This report is organized into two parts. Part I reviews methods coupling finite element analysis with a probabilistic description of the input parameters. Emphasis is placed on taking into account the spatial variability of material properties. This has been done by introducing the concept of random fields and the related discretization techniques. Second-moment approaches (including the perturbation and the weighted integral methods) are reviewed as well as the so-called finite element reliability methods. The spectral stochastic finite element method (SSFEM) is presented, which is claimed to provide after post-processing second-moment as well as reliability results. There has been little comparison of SSFEM with the other approaches, at least no comparison with the perturbation method in the context of second-moment analysis, and no reliability study at all. Part II aims at making these comparisons and thus evaluating the efficiency and accuracy of SSFEM with respect to more classical approaches. MATLAB is used in the analyses. Second-moment approaches are compared using the example of computing the settlement of a foundation over an elastic soil mass with spatially varying Young's modulus. The serviceability of a foundation over an elastic soil mass with spatially varying Young's modulus is investigated with regard to reliability analysis.

Available online: http://nisee.berkeley.edu/documents/SEMM/SEMM-2000-08.pdf (10 MB)