Search Results (210)

Single-story unreinforced masonry rural houses along the Tanlu Earthquake Belt in Anhui Province are generally constructed without ring beams and tie columns, resulting in poor structural integrity and low seismic performance. This paper proposes a convenient single-sided High-Ductility Concrete Strip (HDCS) retrofitting method. Two 1:2 scaled test specimens, namely the unretrofitted model M1 and HDCS single-side retrofitted model M2, were fabricated for shaking table tests. Systematic analyses were carried out based on white noise sweep tests, failure modes, acceleration responses and inter-story displacement responses. The test results show that HDCS possesses excellent tensile capacity, which forms continuous confinement at wall joints and openings to boost structural stiffness and greatly restrain post-seismic stiffness degradation, as well as achieve more uniform structural deformation distribution. Under strong seismic excitations, the unretrofitted model suffers severe damage, including penetrating diagonal shear cracks and separation between gable walls and lower walls. In contrast, damage of the retrofitted model is concentrated within the HDCS overlay, realizing damage redistribution and preventing brittle failure of the main masonry. HDCS stabilizes the distribution of acceleration amplification factors and restrains wall rocking and stress concentration around openings. Although single-sided strengthening induces slight out-of-plane effects, its adverse influence is acceptable. Full article

This article explores spiritual formation in Scripture through moments of divine–human encounter marked by mutual availability—what the Hebrew Bible names as hineni (“Here I am”). Through a theological and narrative reading of four representative figures, Abraham, Hagar, Mary, and Paul, it argues that formation unfolds not in abstraction but within concrete, storied contexts where divine presence meets human openness and reorients identity. While hineni is a Hebrew term, this study demonstrates that the posture it names continues across the biblical canon, moving from covenantal summons and divine initiative in the Old Testament to embodied consent and conversional surrender in the New Testament. Attending to the triadic pattern of orientation, disorientation, and reorientation, the article shows how place functions as a mediating context for encounter without displacing God as the primary agent of formation. Together, these narratives reveal a consistent biblical grammar of availability in which God’s prior “Here I am” evokes human response, shaping identity, vocation, and participation in God’s redemptive work. Full article

This paper, based on a keynote given at the Nordic Environmental and Sustainability Educators Conference, explores a set of principles that might inform the responses of environmental educators, in particular those working in Europe, to the growth in political authoritarianism allied with climate denial and ecological extractivism. Taking the form of a manifesto and intended to prompt debate and mutual support, the piece proposes 11 principles: Don’t panic; Acknowledge your own emotions; Explore Possibilities Beyond the Classroom; Work with hope as praxis; Proliferate stories of change; Nurture alternatives; Name and protect gains; Diversify resources and tactics; Practice simple sabotage; See the bigger picture; and Don’t forget the dancing. Full article

The response modification factor R is a fundamental parameter in seismic design, linking the elastic demand expected under strong ground motion to the reduced forces used in practice. It reflects the capacity of well-detailed structures to dissipate energy through stable inelastic behavior while maintaining sufficient strength, stiffness, and deformation capacity to prevent collapse. Accordingly, R directly influences design base shear, member forces, reinforcement demands and expected seismic performance. It is prescribed by seismic codes as a single typology dependent value, although analytical evidence indicates that its magnitude varies systematically with structural configuration. Therefore, this study decomposes R for twelve reinforced concrete moment-resisting frame archetypes that combine three heights (4, 8, and 14 stories) with four span configurations (1–4 spans) over a constant 12 m plan length. All frames are designed per ACI 318-19 and ASCE/SEI 7-22 for the Pedernales, Ecuador, subduction-zone seismic hazard. The response modification factor R is evaluated through a component-based decomposition that separates the effects of ductility, overstrength, and redundancy—namely the capacity ductility ${\mu }_c$, the demand ductility ${\mu }_d$, the overstrength $\mathsf{\Omega }$, and a geometric redundancy index ${\rho }_g$, using bilinearized pushover analyses. Dynamic verification, used here as a consistency check, is explicitly restricted to the low-rise class (four-story frames) through nonlinear response-history analysis under eleven spectrum-matched ground-motion records; results for the 8- and 14-story frames are therefore pushover-based only. To bracket the inelastic reduction capacity, a demand-based companion factor $R^{*}$ is reported and defined as the demand-based counterpart of R, providing a capacity-oriented estimate R and a demand-oriented companion estimate $R^{*}$. R ranges from 3.80 to 14.56, whereas $R^{*}$ ranges from 1.82 to 7.63. The component ranges are the capacity ductility ${\mu }_c=6.04$–$11.50$, the demand ductility ${\mu }_d=3.04$–$5.98$, the overstrength $\mathsf{\Omega }=1.19$–$1.38$, and the geometric redundancy index ${\rho }_g=0.485$–$1.000$. Capacity ductility saturates in taller frames (about $\sim 12\%$ variation). In addition, $\mathsf{\Omega }$ and ${\rho }_g$ exhibit a mechanical trade-off that challenges the independence assumption implicit in the multiplicative decomposition. Dynamic results corroborate the pushover-implied demand only for the low-rise class; no extrapolation to taller frames is claimed. Overall, the findings motivate configuration-sensitive analytical calibration as a prerequisite for any future normative discussion on R. Full article

Ayman Al-Otoum is a major contemporary Jordanian novelist whose fiction is marked by sustained engagement with Qur’anic language and religious discourse. This study argues that religious intertextuality in His Name Is Ahmad functions not as ornamental reference but as a form of narrative ethics that shapes moral resistance and readerly interpretation. Rather than offering a descriptive account of Qur’anic echoes, this study adopts a close-reading approach to examine how sacred discourse functions within the novel’s narrative architecture. The analysis focuses on two interrelated dimensions: linguistic intertextuality, manifested in Qur’anic diction, devotional formulas, ritual terminology, and theophoric naming, and narrative intertextuality, expressed through prophetic stories, sacred history, and archetypal scriptural patterns. The findings demonstrate that religious intertextuality functions as a central narrative mechanism through which the novel articulates its ethical vision. Sacred discourse further emerges as an internally persuasive ethical language through which institutional authority and social power are critically evaluated without overt ideological confrontation. This study proposes a refined analytical model for examining the narrative productivity of sacred discourse in contemporary Arabic fiction. This study thus reaffirms the continuing analytical significance of Qur’anic intertexts for current debates at the intersection of religion, literature, and cultural critique. Full article

The concrete industry intends to include HPC for structural applications in Southern Europe and, therefore, Greece is a region characterized by stricter and problem-oriented sizing and reinforcement limitations due to its strong seismicity. For this purpose, the effect of using of high performance concrete (HPC) on the dimensioning of conventional reinforced concrete (RC) and prestressed concrete (PC) structures is investigated by designing two ten-story office buildings and typical PC pedestrian, railway, and road bridges, while conforming to all the relevant provisions of the Eurocodes. The designs involve practical construction forms obeying geometric limitations, while satisfying all serviceability and ultimate limit states for conventional and accidental earthquake loads. Conventional strength-class concrete, namely C30 for buildings and C35 for PC bridges, and HPC concrete classes C60 to C120 are considered. Based on the parametric designs, it is concluded that using HPC leads to a reduction in concrete volume of between 30% and 50% compared to conventional concrete use. This reduction, however, depends strongly on the design-controlling criteria, building occupancy, and bridge type and span, which may lead to smaller material savings, particularly where serviceability criteria govern. The analysis is extended in order to also investigate the increase in the design service life of these structural forms under marine chloride exposure conditions, using C90 and conventional concretes. It is shown that, in addition to the material reductions above, the use of HPC also results in a significant increase in the design service life of the structures considered. Full article

Given the widespread application of multi-story modular container building structures, this article proposes a new seismic isolation system called the “sliding friction isolation system (IS)” that utilizes friction energy dissipation between containers. Firstly, lateral stiffness tests were conducted on a 20 ft container, a 40 ft container, and 20 ft connected containers. The constraint consists of four fixed-bottom corner pieces, and the load is achieved using a symmetrical longitudinal concentrated loading method. Their stiffness values were 58.07 kN/mm, 33.41 kN/mm, and 60.03 kN/mm, respectively, providing the necessary parameters for IS. Secondly, an IS model was established, and based on the theory of random vibration, the relationship between c_ei (the equivalent damping of i layer of the structure) and μ (the inter-layer friction coefficient) of the system was obtained. Thirdly, a nonlinear finite element model of a six-story container building was established. Namely, the non-isolation system with standard damping ratios (NIS-sdr), the non-isolation system with equivalent damping ratio (NIS-edr), and the IS. Elastic-plastic nonlinear time-history analyses were then conducted to study the dynamic responses of three systems under strong earthquakes. The analyses yielded the top displacement of the structure, each structural layer’s maximum displacement and displacement angle, the slip of each layer, the hysteresis loops, and the cumulative dissipated energy of IS. The results show that compared to NIS sdr and NIS edr, IS can effectively reduce the maximum interlayer displacement. The largest angular displacement between the structural layer of IS and NIS-edr is far less than that of NIS-sdr. The spectral characteristics of seismic waves (the EL-Centro wave, Taft wave, and artificial wave) can significantly affect the dynamic response of IS. Additionally, the length of the sliding hole on the corner piece can be set to 35 mm based on the displacement of each layer under the Taft wave to meet the standards for container houses (T/CECS 1932-2025). Full article

In performance-based earthquake engineering (PBEE), fragility curves hold significant importance for a reliable risk assessment of the existing reinforced concrete (RC) structures. Fragility curves require numerous incremental nonlinear dynamic analyses, which are highly time-consuming and computationally intensive. However, predicting the fragility curve parameters of RC structures by a machine learning algorithm could effectively reduce this cost. In this study, machine learning (ML)-based numerical analyses were performed in order to predict the fragility curve parameters of the existing RC structures, considering rapidly observable structural parameters by street survey. The construction date, story number, plan irregularities, soft story, and damage states are the main variables that are considered in this study. Hence, a dataset comprising the results of 620 structural fragility analyses was compiled from the existing literature. Key fragility parameters, namely the median and standard deviation, are predicted using several machine learning algorithms, including Random Forest (RF), Extreme Gradient Boosting (XGBoost), Support Vector Machine (SVM), and Artificial Neural Networks (ANNs). The performance of the proposed models is evaluated using R², RMSE, and MAE metrics under a five-fold cross-validation scheme. Furthermore, nonlinear dynamic analyses are conducted on a representative set of structural models to validate the machine learning predictions. The results indicate that the ANN model achieves the highest predictive accuracy, followed by ensemble tree-based methods, demonstrating the capability of machine learning approaches to effectively capture complex nonlinear relationships between seismic input parameters and structural response. The proposed framework significantly reduces computational effort while maintaining reliable prediction accuracy, offering an efficient tool for seismic risk assessment and fragility estimation of existing structures. Full article

This study examines the hypothetical issue of the impact of ancient Egyptian beliefs on Africa as a whole. Several focal points are explored. These include (1). The situation of the discipline of folklore within allied academic specializations. (2). Culture diffusion within Africa, and (3). Spoken folk stories as the only field that integrates, in the space and time continuum, culture on the one hand, with its bearers/(society), on the other. (4). [Beside the] colonial past, the problem, is a result of a number of academic factors that include: (a). The establishment at universities of African studies departments that confine the continent to the sub-Saharan tier excluding Africa of the North; thus, folklore is isolated without a proper stage for studying it academically (see Dorson 1972); (b). The stereotyping concerning the capacity of scholars with unfamiliar names or recognized departmental membership as capable of dealing with theory or innovation, though some of their ideas are adopted by the famous without accrediting the source; (c). Ignoring the unfamiliarity for the family (especially under conditions of secrecy; cf. bias, ethnocentrism); and (d). Inadequacy of academic classroom pedagogy on the basics of verbal lore. Folklore in its original, mainly verbal branches, as represented by Stith Thompson’s monumental works on motif (1955–1958), and its predecessor by Antti Aarne on Type, (1910, 1928, 1961/1964), whose coverage, especially on Africa of the North, is seriously lacking in both the Type and Motif Indexes. The tracking of this line begins with recent calls for need for morphological studies of a South African tale (Dseagu [2001] 2021). An association among various regions of Africa with ancient Egypt concerning mythological contacts merits this investigation. Full article

To explore the evolution of dynamic characteristics of Chuan-Dou timber structures under different damage states, this study takes a typical Chuan-Dou timber structure in Southwest China as the research object. A 1:7 scaled model of a two-story timber frame with five main columns and four secondary columns, three bays, and two rooms was designed and fabricated, and combined pseudo-static and dynamic tests were carried out. When the specimen was in three typical states, namely intact, moderate damage, and severe damage, the sudden release method was adopted to obtain structural vibration responses. The natural frequencies and damping ratios in the X- and Y-directions under each state were identified, and the damage sensitivity differences among stiffness, frequency, and damping ratio were compared and analyzed. The test results show that with the aggravation of damage degree, structural stiffness degrades continuously, and the natural frequency shows a monotonic decreasing trend. The X-direction frequency decreases from 11.178 Hz to 7.8 Hz, and the Y-direction frequency decreases from 6.2 Hz to 5.156 Hz. The damping ratio increases significantly. The X-direction damping ratio increases from 3.552% to 8.951% (an increase of 152.0%), and the Y-direction damping ratio increases from 4.391% to 11.94% (an increase of 171.9%). Comparative analysis shows that the change amplitude of the damping ratio is about 5 to 10 times that of the natural frequency, and it has higher identification sensitivity to structural non-linear damage behavior. This paper innovatively applies the frequency-damping ratio dual-index collaborative determination strategy to Chuan-Dou timber structures, establishes a damage identification method based on the evolution of dynamic characteristic parameters, and discusses the engineering application paths of sensor optimal layout strategy, structural health archive establishment, and post-earthquake rapid screening. The research results can provide experimental basis and technical reference for daily health monitoring, post-earthquake rapid identification, and seismic performance evaluation of traditional timber structures of Chuan-Dou timber structures. Full article

This paper proposes a machine-learning-assisted framework for modal sensitivity analysis of systems with viscoelastic damping elements, including both classical and fractional rheological models. Surrogate models are trained to approximate natural frequencies over a prescribed parameter space using two sampling strategies (Grid and Latin Hypercube) and two regression approaches: multi-layer perceptron (MLP) and Gaussian process regression (GPR). Sensitivities are obtained from the surrogates by finite differences and complemented by model-interpretability measures, namely permutation feature importance (PFI) and Shapley Additive Explanations (SHAP). The surrogate-based results are compared with analytically obtained sensitivities. Local first- and second-order sensitivities of natural frequencies are derived analytically using the direct differentiation method (DDM) for a nonlinear eigenvalue problem formulated in the Laplace domain and further transformed into dimensionless sensitivity measures. The methodology is demonstrated for a single-degree-of-freedom oscillator with classical and fractional Kelvin damper models and a two-story frame equipped with a fractional Kelvin damper. The results show very good agreement between analytical and surrogate-based sensitivities. Feature-importance rankings obtained by PFI and SHAP are consistent with the dimensionless sensitivities and capture changes in parameter influence under varying damping levels. Dispersion studies indicate only minor ranking variations. Full article

Balancing structural safety and economic efficiency in super-tall building design remains a formidable challenge. To address this issue, this study proposes a genetic-algorithm-based multi-variable, multi-objective optimization method. The design variables include the member sizes and vertical layout positions of outrigger and belt trusses, as well as the cross-sectional dimensions of mega-columns. Total structural weight and maximum inter-story drift ratio are adopted as objective functions, while code-specified constraints, such as shear-weight ratio, stiffness-weight ratio, and axial compression ratio, are incorporated to formulate the fitness evaluation for optimization. Taking a 300 m baseline structure designed for 6-degree seismic intensity and equipped with two outrigger trusses and three belt trusses as an example, single-variable sensitivity analyses are first performed. The results show that optimizing any single parameter can yield certain local improvements, yet it cannot overcome the weight–deformation trade-off induced by strong variable coupling. By selecting representative feasible solutions from the multi-variable solution set that match the “optimal” values identified by single-variable optimization as benchmarks, the multi-variable optimum reduces the total structural weight by approximately 6.5–18.4% relative to these representative designs. Moreover, optimal layout strategies of outrigger and belt trusses are investigated for two typical building heights (200 m and 300 m) and two seismic intensity levels associated with design ground motions having a 10% exceedance probability in 50 years, namely 6-degree (0.05 g) and 8-degree (0.20 g). Finally, the proposed method is validated through a case study of a super-tall financial center in Chongqing, where the total structural weight is reduced by 12.3% after optimization while the inter-story drift ratio still satisfies relevant code requirements. The results demonstrate that the proposed framework can generate competitive feasible solutions and provide a systematic means to achieve a balanced trade-off between structural safety and economic efficiency for outrigger–belt-truss super-tall buildings. Full article

The short career of the Philadelphia-built transatlantic steamship S.S. Lewis (1851–1853) offers an instructive look at speculation, financing, and operating a steamer in the mid-19th century United States. S.S. Lewis was built as an American entry into the highly competitive arena of the transatlantic steam packet service. An early propeller steamer, it was heralded as an exemplar of American technology and shipbuilding prowess. It was also cleverly marketed, and named for Samuel Shaw (S.S.) Lewis, the Boston-based agent for Cunard. Following the failure of the transatlantic partnership that operated S.S. Lewis, the vessel entered the isthmian service from Nicaragua to San Francisco during the California Gold Rush. It wrecked, without loss of life, in April 1853 north of the Golden Gate. The wreck site, known to pioneering wreck divers for decades, is now archaeologically described and assessed for the first time. The post-wreck saga of the site is an important part of the story of the evolution of maritime archaeology in California. Full article

Toponyms, i.e., place names, are fundamental for reconstructing the diachronic development of communities without written records, encoding unique historical and cultural data of any civilisation; however, they are vulnerable to loss as languages decline. This also happens for the scarcely documented language Kula (or Tanglapui), a Papuan Alor-Pantar language (Trans-New Guinea macro-family) from Eastern Alor, Southeastern Indonesia (Alor-Pantar Archipelago, Timor area). The spatial knowledge encapsulated in Kula toponyms has been critically threatened by resettlement since the 1960s, alongside its declining daily usage. To preserve this heritage, this article presents a systemised dataset of Kula place names derived from oral traditions, documented for the first time during fieldwork between 2023 and 2026. Data collection followed established language documentation methodologies, utilising semi-structured interviews and community verification with elder native speakers and local consultants to ensure adherence to ethical standards and cultural accuracy of recording practices. The dataset comprises 31 entries of place names, each detailing toponymic variants, glosses/folk etymologies, associated natural resources, stories/historical elements, settlement type, location, habitation status, and internal and external tribal links when information is available. This paper fills a critical gap in Timor-Alor-Pantar linguistics, offering an open-access resource for reconstructing migration patterns and preserving the Kula people’s collective memory against accelerating language endangerment. Full article

This article explores Katherine Sonderegger’s thesis that in Christian prayer, not only does the person pray, but God prays. Though such an idea runs contrary to the settled conviction in Christian spirituality that the human person prays to God, this paper enquires into the idea that God also prays in the person with a study of Ignatius of Loyola’s Spiritual Diary. That record of his spiritual experiences suggests that not only did he listen to God’s prayer in him, but that this listening comprised a spiritual itinerary in which he was led into a deeper experience of God’s prayerful laboring in him. Following this itinerary, this article proceeds in three parts. First, a study of Ignatius’s prayer to the mediators reveals that in his petitions, he sought to hear the intercessory prayer of Mary and Jesus. Second, he found himself discovering a new way to name God as he celebrated the mass; that newness resided not in a new vocabulary but in his participation in the prayer of the Son to the Father. Finally, Ignatius experienced the grace of loqüela in which he heard a kind of celestial music whose tone and language moved him to a simple, contemplative admiration of God. More than the story of a mystic with an uncommon ability to listen to God, Ignatius’s journey into greater attention to God’s language within him is the story of grace, God’s life, which is always present, active, and audible in the believer’s prayer. Full article