https://hdl.handle.net/10259/8515 2026-04-27T19:53:15Z https://hdl.handle.net/10259/8626 Earthquake Vulnerability and the State-of-the-Art of Hybrid Structural Reinforcement and Soil Improvement Methods for NonEngineered Structures Ortiz Palacio, Santiago; Ibáñez García, Sergio; López Ausín, Víctor; Porres Benito, José Ángel In the course of the last decades many efforts have been focused on the design of effective countermeasures to retrofit pre-existing engineered structures -including both buildings and civil constructions- to properly resist the effects of primary and secondary seismic failure induced mechanisms. On the other hand, due to several reasons which will be here summarized, non-engineered buildings (e.g.: unreinforced masonry structures, shack housing in developing countries, adobe dwellings, etc.) have not been so widely studied. As these structures are far from simple, they pose many interesting issues regarding earthquake vulnerability and the challenging tasks of either retrofitting their design or performing soil and foundation improvements in frequently difficult psycho-environmental settings. In this presentation, some of the most outstanding features of non-engineered buildings will be detailed. Also, a summary of some of the most effective approaches of hybrid structural and soil improvements will be discussed with some guidelines for future studies. Trabajo presentado en: 6th International Conference on Earthquake Geotechnical (6ICEGE) that was held on November 1-4, 2015, in Christchurch, New Zealand 2015-01-01T00:00:00Z https://hdl.handle.net/10259/8625 Geology and Geomorphology of Azokh Caves Domínguez Alonso, Patricio; Aracil Ávila, Enrique; Porres Benito, José Ángel; Andrews, Peter; Lynch, Edward P.; Murray, John Azokh Cave is located in the Lesser Caucasus and is hosted in Mesozoic limestone. It comprises a series of karstic cavities, chambers and passageways that interconnect to form a larger cave network, the trend of which appears to have been influenced by fracture patterns in the bedrock. The geomorphology of the currently accessible areas of the cave is presented, with many of its speleological features described in detail for the first time. Electrical resistivity tomography is used to examine variation in thickness of sediments infilling the inner chambers of the cave. This information, coupled with data relating to the surface topography of the cave infill, sheds light on patterns of sediment deposition within the cave system. It remains unclear whether the cave formed from epigenic or hypogenic speleological processes (or a combination of the two). This question is further hampered by the presence of a large bat population in the interior of the cave, the guano deposits of which have modified the inner galleries. 2016-10-01T00:00:00Z https://hdl.handle.net/10259/8620 Geophysical and in situ testing applied to site characterisation for nonengineered structures in developing regions Ortiz Palacio, Santiago; Ibáñez García, Sergio; López Ausín, Víctor; Porres Benito, José Ángel Residential dwellings have been estimated to represent more than three quarters of the building stock around the globe, most of which are not believed to have been properly engineered (that is, designed by architects or engineers and constructed by skilful workers with adequate materials). Narrowing the scope to developing countries, over a 90 percent of the population is deemed to be living, working or studying in nonengineered buildings. In earthquake-prone regions, these weak structures can become deathtraps for their occupants, forlornly adding to the casualty lists of recent and past seismic events. Thus, improving seismic resilience for vernacular housing has increasingly become a main theme for researchers. Also, other geotechnical issues, such as subsidences, slope instabilities, excessive settlement on soft soils, groundwater, inadequate designs, etc., are responsible for substantial risk of structural damages, ranging from small structural pathologies to major disasters. One of the keys to develop new safe and efficient foundation designs, or to retrofit existing ones, is to make available portable and low-budget ground probing techniques. This document will describe some of the most feasible in situ devices available, as well as discuss how seismic and electric methods can be used as portable and powerful tools to characterise both the strength and the stiffness of soils thanks to recent developments in stablishing the relationship between geophysical results and traditional geotechnical parameters (such as the SPT, the angle of internal friction, shear strength, etc.), with the help of statistical methods and dimensional analysis techniques. Trabajo presentado para el congreso Geotechnical and Geophysical Site Characterisation 5 de 2016 2016-01-01T00:00:00Z https://hdl.handle.net/10259/8618 Latest experiences in complex soil investigation in the Spanish Plateau of Castile Ortiz Palacio, Santiago; Porres Benito, José Ángel In recent years, many geotechnical specialists must confront the need of accomplishing difficult designing tasks under very restricted budgets (tasks such as the design of complex foundations, avoiding slope movements, the development of earth containing structures, evaluating and repairing settlements, etc.). This implies that soil in-situ probing and lab testing may be quite limited on many occasions. Therefore, it usually falls on the specialists the responsibility of optimizing the resources at hand to fully characterize the morphological and mechanical soil qualities, gaining the best safety factors as possible in the process. In order to illustrate this challenging duty of optimization of the problem of quality soil characterization vs. probing budget, some of the latest and most interesting of the authors’ experiences in the Spanish Plateau of Castile will be covered. Trabajo presentado en: Fourth International Conference on Geotechnical and Geophysical Site Characterisation, ISC'4, held at the Porto de Galinhas (Pernanbuco), Brazil, 18-21 September 2012. 2013-01-01T00:00:00Z