Abstract
Geophysical surveys, and specifically seismic tests, provide powerful tools for geotechnical site investigation. Indeed, they cover the whole range of soils and rocks, independently of particle size, and provide data in the natural state for the characterization at different scales. Assessment of the reliability of the most popular techniques is therefore of primary importance for static and seismic applications. This chapter reports some data from recent experiments devoted to reliability assessment at some reference sites, where intra-method and inter-method variability has been studied. The propagation of the measured uncertainties in soil porosity assessment and seismic ground response analyses is also considered to provide an insight on the consequences in the practice of geotechnical engineering.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Andrus, R. D., & Stokoe, K. H. (2000). Liquefaction resistance of soils from shear-wave velocity. Journal of Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering, 126, 1015–1025.
Andrus, R., Chung, R., & Stokoe, K. H. (1998). Delineation of densified sand at treasure island by SASW testing in geotechnical site characterization. In Proceedings of the First International Conference on Site Characterization (Isc’98) (pp. 459–64).
Bard, P., & Participants, SESAME (2004). The SESAME project: An overview and main results. In Proceedings of 13th World Conference on Earthquake Engineering, Vancouver, Bc, Canada, August (pp. 1–6).
Bard, P.-Y., Cadet, H., Endrun, B., Hobiger, M., Renalier, F., Theodulidis, N., et al. (2010). From non-invasive site characterization to site amplification: Recent advances in the use of ambient vibration measurements. In Earthquake Engineering in Europe. Berlin: Springer.
Biot, M. A. (1956a). Theory of propagation of elastic waves in a fluid-saturated porous solid. I. Low-frequency range. The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 28, 168–178.
Biot, M. A. (1956b). Theory of propagation of elastic waves in a fluid-saturated porous solid. II. Higher frequency range. The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 28, 179–191.
Butcher, A., Campanella, R., Kaynia, A., & Massarsch, K. (2005). Seismic cone downhole procedure to measure shear wave velocity—A guideline prepared by ISSMGE TC10: Geophysical testing in geotechnical engineering. In Proceedings of the 16th International Conference on Soil Mechanics and Geotechnical Engineering, Osaka, Japan.
Callerio, A., Janicki, K., Milani, D., Priano, S., & Signori, M. (2013). Cross-hole tests at Zelazny most tailings pond, Poland-highlights and statistical interpretation of results. In Near Surface Geoscience 2013-19th Eage European Meeting of Environmental and Engineering Geophysics.
Cho, G. C., & Santamarina, J. C. (2001). Unsaturated particulate materials—particle-level studies. Journal of Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering, 127, 84–96.
Cornou, C., Ohrnberger, M., Boore, D., Kudo, K., & Bard, P-Y. (2006). Derivation of structural models from ambient vibration array recordings: Results from an international blind test. In Proceedings of the Third International Symposium on the Effects of Surface Geology on Seismic Motion, Grenoble, France.
Cosentini, R. M., & Foti, S. (2014). Evaluation of porosity and degree of saturation from seismic and electrical data. Geotechnique, 64, 278–286.
Cox, B., Wood, C., & Teague, D. (2014). Synthesis of the UTexas1 surface wave dataset blind-analysis study: Inter-analyst dispersion and shear wave velocity uncertainty. In Geo-Congress 2014: Geo-Characterization and Modeling for Sustainability (pp. 850–859).
Di Giulio, G., Savvaidis, A., et al. (2012). Exploring the model space and ranking a best class of models in surface-wave dispersion inversion: Application at European strong-motion sites. Geophysics, 77, B147–B166.
Foti, S., Comina, C., Boiero, D., & Socco, L. (2009). Non-uniqueness in surface-wave inversion and consequences on seismic site response analyses. Soil Dynamics and Earthquake Engineering, 29, 982–993.
Foti, S., Garofalo, F., et al. (2017). Guidelines for the good practice of surface wave analysis. A product of the Interpacific project. Bulletin of Earthquake Engineering, on line first. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10518-017-0206-7.
Foti, S., Lai, C. G., & Lancellotta, R. (2002). Porosity of fluid-saturated porous media from measured seismic wave velocities. Géotechnique, 52, 359–373.
Foti, S., Lai, C. G., Rix, G. J., & Strobbia, C. (2014). Surface wave methods for near-surface site characterization. United States: CRC Press.
Foti, S., Parolai, S., Albarello, D., & Picozzi, M. (2011). Application of surface-wave methods for seismic site characterization. Surveys in Geophysics, 32, 777–825.
Foti, S., & Passeri, F. (2016). Reliability of soil porosity estimation from seismic wave velocities. In Isc5-International Conference on Geotechnical and Geophysical Soil Characterisation, Gold Coast, Australia (Vol. 1, pp. 425–430).
Garofalo, F., Foti, S., et al. (2016a). InterPACIFIC project: Comparison of invasive and non-invasive methods for seismic site characterization. Part I: Intra-comparison of surface wave methods. Soil Dynamics and Earthquake Engineering, 82, 222–240.
Garofalo, F., Foti, S., et al. (2016b). InterPACIFIC project: Comparison of invasive and non-invasive methods for seismic site characterization. Part II: Inter-comparison between surface-wave and borehole methods. Soil Dynamics and Earthquake Engineering, 82, 241–254.
Hadamard, J. (1902). Sur Les Problèmes Aux Dérivées Partielles Et Leur Signification Physique. Princeton University Bulletin, 49–52.
Idriss, I. (2004). Evolution of the state of practice. In International Workshop on the Uncertainties in Nonlinear Soil Properties and Their Impact on Modeling Dynamic Soil Response, Pacific Earthquake Engineering Research Center, Richmond, California.
Jamiolkowski, M. (2012). Role of geophysical testing in geotechnical site characterization. Soils and Rocks International Journal of Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering, 2: 117–137.
Jamiolkowski, M. (2014). Soil mechanics and the observational method: Challenges at the Zelazny most copper tailings disposal facility. Géotechnique, 64, 590–618.
Jamiolkowski, M., & Masella, A. (2015). Geotechnical characterization of copper tailings at Zelazny most site. Keynote Lecture, DMT, 15, 25–42.
Kaneko, F., Kanemori, T., & Tonouchi, K. (1990). Low-frequency shear wave logging in unconsolidated formations for geotechnical applications. In Geophysical Applications for Geotechnical Investigations. United States: ASTM International.
Kayen, R., Moss, R., et al. (2013). Shear-wave velocity-based probabilistic and deterministic assessment of seismic soil liquefaction potential. Journal of Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering, 139, 407–419.
Kim, D., Park, H., & Bang, E. (2013). Round Robin test for comparative study of in-situ seismic tests. Geotechnical and Geophysical Site Characterization, 4, 1427–1434.
Lai, C. G. (2015). Non-conventional methods for measuring dynamic properties of geomaterials. In Proceedings of 6th International Conference on Earthquake Geotechnical Engineering, Christchurch, New Zealand (pp. 1–4).
Laurenzano, G., Priolo, E., et al. (2017). Site response estimation at Mirandola by virtual reference station. Bulletin of Earthquake Engineering, 15, 2393–2409.
Mitchell, J. K., & Soga, K. (2005). Fundamentals of soil behavior. New Jersey: Wiley.
Nakamura, Y. (1989). A method for dynamic characteristics estimation of subsurface using microtremor on the ground surface. Railway Technical Research Institute, Quarterly Reports, 30.
Oh, W., & Vanapalli, S. (2011). The relationship between the elastic and shear modulus of unsaturated soils. In E. Alonso and A. Gens (Eds.), Unsaturated Soils, Proceedings of the 5th International Conference on Unsaturated Soils (pp. 341–346).
Passeri, F., Foti, S., Cox, B., & Rodriguez-Marek A. (2017). Influence of estimated epistemic uncertainties in shear wave velocity models on ground response analyses. Earthquake Spectra (Submitted to).
Raptakis, D. G. (2012). Pre-loading effect on dynamic soil properties: Seismic methods and their efficiency in geotechnical aspects. Soil Dynamics and Earthquake Engineering, 34, 69–77.
Rathje, E. M., Kottke, A. R., & Trent, W. L. (2010). Influence of input motion and site property variabilities on seismic site response analysis. Journal of Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering, 136, 607–619.
Régnier, J., Bonilla, L. F., et al. (2016). International benchmark on numerical simulations for 1D, nonlinear site response (Prenolin): Verification phase based on canonical cases. Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America, 106, 2112–2135.
Régnier, J., Bonilla, L. F., et al. (2018). Prenolin: International benchmark on 1D nonlinear site response analysis—validation phase exercise. Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America. https://doi.org/10.1785/0120170210
Schnabel, P. B. (1972). Shake a computer program for earthquake response analysis of horizontally layered sites (EERC Report). Berkeley: University of California.
Socco, L. V., Foti, S., & Boiero, D. (2010). Surface-wave analysis for building near-surface velocity models—established approaches and new perspectives. Geophysics, 75, a83–a102.
Stewart, J. P., & Kwok, A. O. (2008). Nonlinear seismic ground response analysis: Code usage protocols and verification against vertical array data. In Geotechnical Earthquake Engineering And Soil Dynamics IV. United States: American Society of Civil Engineers.
Stewart, J. P., Afshari, K., & Hashash, Y. M. (2014). Guidelines for performing hazard-consistent one-dimensional ground response analysis for ground motion prediction. Peer Rep, 16.
Tarabusi, G., & Caputo, R. (2017). The use of HVSR measurements for investigating buried tectonic structures: The Mirandola anticline, Northern Italy, as a case study. International Journal of Earth Sciences, 106, 341–353.
Teague, D. P., Cox, B., & Rathje, E. M. (2017). Measured vs. predicted site response at the garner valley downhole array considering shear wave velocity uncertainty from borehole and surface wave methods. Soil Dynamics And Earthquake Engineering (Submitted to).
Tran, K. T., & Hiltunen, D. R. (2011). An assessment of surface wave techniques at the Texas A&M national geotechnical experimentation site. In Geo-Risk 2011: Risk Assessment and Management. United States: American Society of Civil Engineers.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2018 Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd.
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Foti, S., Passeri, F. (2018). Reliability and Accuracy of Seismic Tests in Geotechnical Site Characterization. In: Krishna, A., Dey, A., Sreedeep, S. (eds) Geotechnics for Natural and Engineered Sustainable Technologies. Developments in Geotechnical Engineering. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-7721-0_10
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-7721-0_10
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Singapore
Print ISBN: 978-981-10-7720-3
Online ISBN: 978-981-10-7721-0
eBook Packages: EngineeringEngineering (R0)