Performance Enhancement of Soil-Structure Systems Using a Controlled Rocking

Application of performance-based design (PBD) in earthquake geotechnical design codes has been gaining attention for the past decade. Strong vibrations (e.g., earthquake loading) may generate an uplift or a partial separation of shallow foundations from the underneath soil. To minimize the damage and keep the superstructure safe from the vibrations, a controlled rocking can be exploited. In this study, a finite element method is used to investigate the effect of nonlinear behavior of foundation geomaterial on the rocking behavior of soil-structure systems. To get a better insight about the rocking behavior of the soil-structure system, nonlinear elastic-perfectly plastic behavior is considered for the simulated geomaterial of the foundation. Next, a parametric study, using a wide range of geomaterials with different stiffness values, is conducted in accordance with high-rise structures with different configurations. The results indicate that a significant proportion of the input energy is dissipated by deploying rotational behavior of shallow foundations especially for the structures on softer geomaterials.