A new computer-based platform has been proposed whose novelty consists in modeling the local site effects of the ground motion propagation using a hybrid approach based on an equivalent linear model. The soil behavior is modeled assuming that both the shear modulus and the damping ratio vary with the shear strain amplitude. So, the hysteretic behavior of the soil is described using the shear modulus degradation and damping ratio curves. In addition, another originality of the proposed system architecture consists in the evaluation of the conditional mean spectrum on the entire Italian territory automatically, knowing the geographical coordinates. The computer-based platform based on signal processing has been developed using a modular programing approach, to enable the selection and the processing of earthquake ground motion records. The proposed computer-based platform combines in unified environment different features, such as (i) selection of ground motion records using both spectral and waveform matching, (ii) signal processing, (iii) response spectra analysis, and (iv) soil response analysis.
In the last few years, modern technologies such as numerical simulations, virtual and augmented reality, and agent-based models represented effective tools to study phenomena, which may not be experimentally reproduced due to costs, inherent hazards, or other constraints (e.g., fire or earthquake emergencies and evacuation from buildings). This paper shows how to integrate a virtual reality platform with numerical simulation tools to reproduce an evolutionary fire emergency scenario. It is computed in real time based on the building information model and a fluid dynamic software. A specific software was also used to simulate in real time the crowd dynamic in the virtual environment during the emergency evacuation process. To demonstrate the applicability of the proposed methodology, the emergency fire evacuation process for an existing school building is presented. The results show that the proposed virtual reality-based system can be employed for reproducing fire emergency scenarios. It can be used to help decision-makers to determine emergency plans and to help firefighters as a training tool to simulate emergency evacuation actions.
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