Abstract Structural damping is often empirically rate-independent wherein the dissipative part of stress depends on history deformation but not its rate change. Hysteresis models are popular for dissipation; and a hysteresis model Bouc-Wen model. If such hysteretic dissipation incorporated in refined finite element model, then involves usual structural dynamics equations along with nonlinear no...

The genus Nekemias (Vitaceae) was first recognized by Rafinesque in 1838. It has been treated as a synonym of Ampelopsis Michx. Recent phylogenetic studies suggest that Ampelopsis as traditionally delimited is paraphyletic. To maintain the monophyly of each of the genera of Vitaceae, we herein segregate the Ampelopsissect.Leeaceifoliae lineage from Ampelopsis and recognize these taxa in Nekemia...

Periodic metafoundations have proven to inherit valuable properties from wave propagating in phononic periodic structures the very low-frequency regime. Therefore, finite locally resonant (LRMs) represent a novel type of seismic isolation for ultralow-frequency applications. In this context, it is still unknown impact that massive resonators with varying frequencies or devices hysteretic behavi...

A taxonomic synopsis of the Altingiaceae is presented, including the taxonomic enumeration and distribution of 15 recognized species based on studies of 1,500 specimens from 24 herbaria throughout the distributional range of the taxa. Previous phylogenetic analyses based on several molecular markers have shown that Altingia and Semiliquidambar are nested within Liquidambar. All Altingia and Sem...

Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is the most common psychological disorder among victims of natural disasters. PTSD prevalence and risk factors among adolescents remain unidentified among victims of the Wen-Chuan earthquake. This study screened survivors to determine the prevalence of PTSD and examined risk factors for PTSD among adolescents at three Wen-Chuan secondary schools. PTSD scree...

To my grandparents. iii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I would like to thank my adviser, Nicholas P. Carter, for his guidance and support all through my graduate study. Many thanks to my project team members, Hillery C. Hunter and Azmat Hussain, who have contributed to this work in many ways. Also thanks to Wen-Mei Hwu for his guidance in the Memory-Efficient EPIC Architecture project. Thanks to the Semicondu...

This article presents numerical studies on semi-active seismic response control of structures equipped with Magneto-Rheological (MR) dampers. A multi-layer artificial neural network (ANN) was employed to mitigate the influence of time delay, This ANN was trained using data from the El-Centro earthquake. The inputs of ANN are the seismic responses of the structure in the current step, and the ou...