Dr Ching-Yi Tsai

Postdoctoral Research Assistant
Department of Civil Engineering

National Taiwan University

Ching-Yi is currently a postdoctoral scholar of the Department of Civil Engineering at the National Taiwan University (NTU) working with Prof Keh-Chyuan Tsai. She attained her PhD degree at NTU (2009-2015) and her bachelor's degree at NTU in 2006 before continuing the 2-year MS program of Structural Engineering. Her master's and PhD thesises were supervised by Prof Tsai. She worked as a full-time research assistant in the National Center for Research on Earthquake Engineering (NCREE) from 2008 to 2009. Ching-Yi was awarded "The Graduate Students Study Abroad Program" sponsored by the Taiwan Ministry of Science and Technology Overseas Project for postgraduate research. As a result, she spent a year from 2013 to 2014 as a Visiting Scholar at the University of Washington working with Dr Jeffrey Berman and Dr Laura Lowes. She was also a recipient of the Sinotech Foundation for Research and Development of Engineering Sciences and Technologies scholarship (2014-2015).

Seismic Design, Tests and Analysis of a Two-Story RC Frame with Buckling-Restrained Braces

The buckling-restrained brace (BRB) is a cost-effective energy dissipation member for seismic resistant steel buildings. Recently, many studies and tests have confirmed BRBs can improve the stiffness, strength, ductility, and energy dissipation of structures. BRBs have been widely applied to steel structures in recent decades. However, the implementation of BRBs for new reinforced concrete (RC) constructions is limited.

This study presents the design, analysis, hybrid and cyclic tests of a two-story RC frame constructed with BRBs (BRB-RCF) at NCREE in Taiwan. The first analytical model uses PISA3D for predicting and simulating the responses of the two-story specimen. After the tests, the prediction model is calibrated based on the experimental results. In order to learn more about the gusset plate force transfer behavior, a second numerical model using Abaqus was constructed. These experimental and analytical studies have confirmed the effectiveness of the design, fabrication and accurate modeling techniques for the proposed BRB-RCF. Tests confirm that the proposed cast-in anchor brackets connecting the BRB gusset to the RC members can successfully transfer the BRB forces into the RC frame. In addition, existing stability evaluation methods for BRBs and gussets are modified to investigate the out-of-plane (OOP) buckling of the first-story BRB observed at the end of tests. By incorporating the flexural effects of the steel casing and the infilled concrete, the proposed stability model satisfactorily predicts the OOP buckling of the first-story BRB and gussets. These research results can be used for the implementation of BRBs in new RC constructions.