Shake Table Testing of Seismic Soil-Foundation-Structure-Interaction

This research involves shake table testing of 1g scale models that mimic the coupled seismic response of a structure on a shallow mat foundation and the foundation soil (termed soil-foundation-structure-interaction or SFSI). In previous research, SFSI effects have been quantified through analytical models, numerical analyses, and limited field data. This research is working towards increasing the amount of empirical data through scale model shake table testing. A suite of earthquake times histories are considered in evaluating a 10th scale soil-structure model using a flexible wall barrel on a 1-D shake table. San Francisco Young Bay Mud (YBM) is used as the prototype soil and a 3-5 story narrow building the prototype structure. Foundation embedment depth, fundamental mode of the structure, dynamic soil strength, and seismic loading function are varied to generate a large database of SFSI results under controlled conditions. The structural response is compared to free-field response to determine the magnitude of the SFSI. A presentation of the full test results is anticipated at the time of the conference