Numerical Study of the Nonlinear Dynamic Behaviour

of Reinforced Concrete Cooling Towers under

Earthquake Excitation

Saeid Sabouri-Ghomi1, Farhad Abedi Nik1, Ali Roufegarinejad2,

Mark A Bradford2,*
1KNT University of Technology, Tehran, Iran
2University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia

(Received: 8 September 2005; Received revised form: 17 January 2006; Accepted: 17 January 2006)

Abstract: Reinforced concrete cooling towers of hyperbolic shell configuration find

widespread application in utilities engaged in the production of electric power. In
designing critical civil infrastructure of this type, it is imperative to consider all of the
possible loading conditions that the cooling tower may experience. One important
loading condition in many nations is that of earthquake excitation, whose influence on
the integrity and stability of cooling towers is profound. Previous research has shown
that the columns supporting a cooling tower are sensitive to earthquake forces, as they
are heavily loaded elements that do not possess high ductility, and understanding the
behaviour of columns under earthquake excitation is vital in structural design because
they provide the load path for the self weight of the tower shell. This paper presents
the results of a finite element investigation of a representative “dry” cooling tower,
using realistic horizontal and vertical acceleration data obtained from the recent and
widely-reported Tabas, Naghan and Bam earthquakes in Iran. The results of both
linear and nonlinear analyses are reported in the paper, the locations of plastic hinges
within the supporting columns are identified and the ramifications of the plastic hinges
on the stability of the cooling tower are assessed. It is concluded that for the (typical)
cooling tower configuration analysed, the columns that are instrumental in providing
a load path are influenced greatly by earthquake loading, and for the earthquake data
used in this study the representative cooling tower would be rendered unstable and
would collapse under the earthquake forces considered.

Key words: columns, cooling towers, earthquakes, nonlinear behaviour, reinforced concrete, stability.

1. INTRODUCTION most critical loading case. Following a strong

Reinforced concrete (RC) cooling towers, which earthquake, power plants are required to provide a post-
comprise of a thin concrete shell of revolution, are disaster function and so cooling towers in these
commonplace in civil engineering infrastructure that is situations must remain viable and robust infrastructural
concerned with the generation of electric power. components. Vigorous industrialisation in Iran over the
Because of their size and the catastrophic ramifications last few years has seen the construction of a number of
of their collapse, it is imperative to consider all possible large RC cooling towers, and the severe catastrophic
conditions of loading in the design of RC cooling earthquakes that have bedevilled the nation and its
towers, and in many nations earthquake loading is the neighbours recently owing to its location within the
*Corresponding author. Email address: Bradford@unsw.edu.au; Fax: +612-9385-6139; Tel: +612-9385-5014.

Advances in Structural Engineering Vol. 9 No. 3 2006 1

 Numerical Study of the Nonlinear Dynamic Behaviour of Reinforced Concrete Cooling Towers under Earthquake Excitation
Alp-Himalaya fault zone are widely known. Because of
this, research into seismic behaviour has been a national
priority in structural engineering, and in particular
studies of the behaviour of RC cooling towers under
earthquake excitation are being undertaken by several
researchers.
Despite the importance of research into the structural
response of cooling towers, which are thin shell structures
and which therefore possess the well-known and often
poorly predicted attributes of imperfection-sensitivity
(Gould 1985, 1988) and the like, the research on their
response to extreme loading from wind or earthquake
excitation reported in the archival literature has not been
overly comprehensive. The main reason for this relative
dearth of research documentation undoubtedly lies in the
difficulty of modelling cooling towers numerically, and
in particular the computational difficulties of analysing
cooling towers utilising many shell elements within a
finite element framework that often renders a multi-
degree of freedom problem intractable because of the
interactions of geometric and material nonlinearities, and
in particular with the difficulties that are associated with
concrete as a material when cracking, thermal effects,
shrinkage, creep and tension stiffening need to be
addressed in the analysis. Gould’s (1985) well-known
text demonstrates some of these computational
difficulties. Some of the earlier and more generic work on
the analysis of cooling towers as shells of revolution,
when acted upon by dynamic loading, has been reported
by Abel and Billington (1974), Niemann (1978), Gran
and Yang (1978, 1980), Wolf and Skrikerud (1980), Wolf
(1986), Ahn and Gould (1989), Bhimaraddi et al. (1991),
Byun and Kapania (1992), Kratzig and Zhuang (1992), Li
and Croll (1993), Yang and Lu (1994), Castiau
(1998), Liao et al. (1999) and Nasir et al. (2002). The
VGB Guideline (1990) provides a useful manual for
designing many cooling towers. Whilst being valuable
contributions to the area, these studies do not properly
address all of the pertinent issues that relate to the
behaviour of large, thin RC shells of revolution, and the
full understanding of their behaviour still remains a grey
area in structural mechanics.
Earthquake-related studies of RC cooling towers are
still quite restrictive in the literature, despite their
obvious importance and relevance to contemporary
engineering practice and to recent global seismic events.
Amongst others, Gran and Young (1978), Wolf and
Skrikerud (1980), Castiau (1991), Zena et al. (1979) and
Sabouri (2000) have investigated the damage that may
occur to cooling towers during an earthquake, and have
concentrated their studies on the importance of the
column elements in a cooling tower in maintaining an
integral structure under earthquake excitation. These
2 Advances in Structural Engineering Vol. 9 No. 3 2006
studies have considered finite element modelling of the
entire RC cooling tower structure, with particular focus
on the columns within the structure.
This paper presents the investigation of a
representative cooling tower (located in the Shazand
thermal power installation in Iran) using the ANSYS 8.0
finite element package (2004). The structure is a “dry”
tower, whose column legs are somewhat longer than
those of “wet” towers. The analysis makes recourse to
the accelerometer data recorded during the quite recent
Tabas, Naghan and Bam earthquakes that occurred in
Iran. Computational times have been optimised by use
of the maximum horizontal and vertical accelerations
experienced during these earthquakes shown in Table 1,
with the associated sector records given in Figure 1. The
nonlinear analysis shows that the stability of the
Shazand tower is compromised by the earthquakes, and
it would certainly collapse under the excitation of the
Tabas and Bam earthquakes.
2. DESCRIPTION OF CASE STUDIES
Thin-walled, RC cooling towers are design-specific
engineering structures, and because of this they are
usually analysed in detail in terms of a specific,
representative structure, rather than in a generic fashion.
Accordingly, the cooling tower in the Shazand thermal
power generating facility in Iran has been selected as a
representative structure in order to study the nonlinear
behaviour of RC cooling towers under earthquake
loading. This tower is one of the tallest RC cooling
towers in Iran with an overall height of 134 m. The
analysis also modelled the soil below the cooling tower,
as this influences greatly the response of the structure
(Ahn and Gould 1989; Yang and Lu 1994; Liao et al.
1999). An important and significant characteristic of the
Shazand tower is its long columns when compared with
those in similar structures, this being typical of a “dry”
tower. The tower consists of a 106 m high concrete
hyperbolic shell, supported by 36 X-type RC columns
that are located every 10° around the circumference of
the hyperboloid and which bear onto a ring type
foundation. The structure is depicted in Figure 2, and the
pertinent structural characteristics of the tower are given
in Table 2. The concrete compressive strength was
assumed to be 30 MPa and the tensile strength of the
reinforcement to be 450 MPa.
The dynamic analysis was performed in two stages.
Firstly, a linear finite element analysis with elastic
elements was undertaken, followed by a nonlinear finite
element analysis with a nonlinear representation of the
concrete columns, so as to better understand the full
structural behaviour of the tower. Exhaustive analyses
were preformed, and it was concluded that the four key
Saeid Sabouri-Ghomi, Farhad Abedi Nik, Ali Roufegarinejad, Mark A Bradford

Table 1. Maximum horizontal and vertical nodes A and B with nodes A′ and B′ allow for
accelerations (% g) quantification of the effects of the relative distortion of
the top and bottom of the tower under seismic excitation.
Horizontal Vertical
Earthquake PGA (% g) PGA (% g)
(1) (2) (3) 3. FINITE ELEMENT MODELLING
The Shazand tower was modelled using the ANSYS 8.0
Tabas 82 57
Naghan 74 50
(2004) finite element software, and because of the
Bam 79 101 axisymmetric nature of the structure, only half of the
tower with meridians between 0° and 180° was
represented. The soil beneath the foundation was
nodes A, B, A′ and B′ shown in Figure 3 are most modelled using the COMBIN40 element, while the
appropriately selected to provide representative data, and foundation itself was modelled with linear three-
in particular the comparisons of the displacements of dimensional SOLID45 elements. The SOLID65 elements

1000 1000

dt = 8 sec 800 dt = 8 sec

800

600 600

Acceleration (cm/s 2)
Acceleration (cm/s 2)

400 400

200 200

0 0

–200 –200

–400 –400

–600 –600

Horizontal
Horizontal component
component of
of Tabas
Tabas earthquake
earthquake Vertical component of Tabas earthquake
–800 –800
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20 0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20
Time (s) Time (s)
(a) Tabas earthquake
800 800
dt = 1.8 sec dt = 1.8 sec
600 600

400 400
Acceleration (cm/s 2)

Acceleration (cm/s 2)

200 200

0 0

–200 –200

–400 –400

–600 –600 Vertical component of

Horizontal component of
Naghan earthquake Naghan earthquake
–800 –800
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
Time (s) Time (s)
(b) Naghan earthquake
1000 1000
dt = 9 sec
dt = 9 sec 800
800

600 600
Acceleration (cm/s2)
Acceleration (cm/s2)

400 400

200 200

0 0

–200 –200

–400 –400

–600 –600

–800 –800
Horizonal component of Bam earthquake Vertical component of Bam earthquake
–1000 –1000
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14

Time (s) Time (s)

(c) Bam earthquake

Figure 1. Earthquake records (accelerations in cm/sec2)

Advances in Structural Engineering Vol. 9 No. 3 2006 3

 Numerical Study of the Nonlinear Dynamic Behaviour of Reinforced Concrete Cooling Towers under Earthquake Excitation
106 m
24 m
Figure 2. Representation of Shazand cooling tower
of ANSYS were used to represent the columns of the
tower. These elements allow for cracking of the concrete
in tension and crushing of the concrete in compression.
Three different elements, viz. SOLID65, SOLID45 and
SHELL63, were used to model the 106 m high
hyperboloid shell. The first one metre of the shell above
the columns would be expected to experience stress
concentrations and extensive nonlinearity, and so the
SOLID65 element was used in this region. The SOLID45
element was used to model the next 5 m above this level,
which uses a linear three-dimensional representation with
eight nodes, each with three degrees of freedom. Finally,
the SHELL63 elastic shell element was used to represent
the remaining 100 m of the hyperbolic shell. This shell
element is useful specifically for dynamic analysis and
Table 2. Dimensions of components of Shazand
cooling tower structure
Component
(1)
Top of shell from foundation
Neck height from foundation
Bottom of shell from foundation
Stiffening ring from foundation
Radius of top of shell
Radius of neck
Radius of bottom of shell
Radius of centre of foundation
Dimensions of column
Dimensions of foundation
Width of top of stiffening ring
Thickness of top of stiffening ring
Length of column
4 Advances in Structural Engineering Vol. 9 No. 3 2006
64.88 m B A
B′ A′
90.95 m
105.4 m
Figure 3. Location of key nodes for structural modelling output
includes both bending and membrane effects. It has six
degrees of freedom at each node (translations in the x, y
and z directions and rotations about the x, y and z axes),
and permits the inclusion of both in-plane and normal
loads in the analysis. All of the columns, as well as the
first metre of the hyperboloid that use the SOLID65
element, were reinforced with the LINK8 three-
dimensional spar, and material nonlinearity was included.
In all cases it was assumed that the concrete was uniform
throughout and without localised or geometric
imperfections. Although not considered, the quality of the
concrete and reinforcement would have a significant
effect on the structural behaviour.
4. NUMERICAL RESULTS
The acceleration records in Figure 1 were used in the
finite element study of the Shazand tower. Cracking of
the concrete was widespread, as well as yielding of the
reinforcement in some of the columns with ensuing
highly nonlinear material behaviour. Concrete cracking
and yielding of the reinforcement was observed to be
Dimension profound in the lower parts of the shell in the region of
(2)
the columns where stress concentrations were expected.
130 m Figure 4 shows the sequential formation of plastic
111.95 m hinges under excitation from the Tabas, Naghan and
24 m
128.5 m
Bam earthquakes, with plastic hinges being identified
32.35 m by yielding of the reinforcement and crushing of the
31.69 m concrete. It can be seen from this figure that plastic
44.84 m hinges develop in the columns, in the contact region of
53.183 m the columns and the foundation ring, at the interface of
1.15 m × 0.70 m
the column and hyperboloid shell and at the intersection
4.2 m × 1.4 m
1.0 m of the two columns. The plastic hinges tend to develop
0.4 m last within the shell region after the columns have
29.56 m experienced damage sufficient to precipitate collapse.
Saeid Sabouri-Ghomi, Farhad Abedi Nik, Ali Roufegarinejad, Mark A Bradford

(a) 15000
Tabas Earthquake

10000
V=C.R.W

5000
V=C.W

Force (tonne)
0

V=C.W
–5000

V=C.R.W
–10000

Nonlinear response Linear response

–15000
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
Time (s)

Naghan Earthquake (b) 15000

10000
V=C.R.W

5000

Force (tonne)
V=C.W

V=C.W
–5000

V=C.R.W
–10000
Nonlinear response Linear response
–15000
0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1 1.2 1.4 1.6 1.8
Time (s)
Bam Earthquake
(c) 15000

10000
V=C.R.W

5000
Force (tonne)

V=C.W

V=C.W
–5000

V=C.R.W
–10000

Nonlinear response Linear response

–15000
Figure 4. Sequential formation of plastic hinges under earthquake 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
excitation Time (s)

Figure 5. Base shear forces under earthquake excitation

The base shear forces experienced in the Tabas,
Naghan and Bam earthquakes are shown in Figure 5, in
which both linear and nonlinear time histories are
depicted. Based on the finite element analysis results,
Figure 5 also shows the chronological development of
plastic hinges within the structure over the duration of
the earthquakes. It can be seen that the linear and
nonlinear responses are close to being coincident in the
initial part of the time histories. After the development
of the plastic hinges, however, it is evident that the
nonlinear structural response decreases, and the forces
within the structure and the base shear forces decrease.
Nonlinear analyses using the Tabas and Bam earthquake
(tonne = 10 kN) (a) Tabas (b) Naghan (c) Bam
records produce divergent solutions after 2.4 and 3.0
seconds respectively, as well as a severe decrease in the
nonlinear base shear response after these times. This
divergence of the solution can be attributed to instability
of the cooling tower structure once these critical times in
the life of the earthquake have been reached.
Figure 6 shows the horizontal displacements of
the key points A, B, A′ and B′ identified in Figure 3.
The displacements of points A and B at the top of the

Advances in Structural Engineering Vol. 9 No. 3 2006 5

 Numerical Study of the Nonlinear Dynamic Behaviour of Reinforced Concrete Cooling Towers under Earthquake Excitation

0.15 0.15

Horizontal displacement (m)

0.1 0.1 Nonlinear response Linear response
Horizontal displacement (m)

0.05 0.05
0 0
–0.05 –0.05
–0.1 –0.1
–0.15 –0.15
A A⬘ B B⬘
–0.2
–0.2
–0.25 0 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5 3
Time (s)
–0.3
0 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5 3
0.15
Time (s)

Horizontal displacement (m)

Nonlinear response Linear response
0.1
0.15
0.05
0.1
Horizontal displacement (m)

0
0.05
–0.05
0
–0.1
–0.05
–0.15
–0.1 0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1 1.2 1.4 1.6 1.8
A A⬘ B B⬘ Time (s)
–0.15
0.3
–0.2 0.25
Horizontal displacement (m)

Nonlinear response Linear response

0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1 1.2 1.4 1.6 1.8 0.2
Time (s) 0.15
0.1
0.35 0.05
Horizontal displacement (m)

0.3 0
0.25
A A⬘ B B⬘ –0.05
0.2
–0.1
0.15
–0.15
0.1
0.05 –0.2
0 0.3 0.6 0.9 1.2 1.5 1.8 2.1 2.4
0
–0.05 Time (s)
–0.1
Figure 7. Horizontal displacement of point B’ under earthquake
–0.15
1 1.2 1.4 1.6 1.8 2 2.2 2.4 excitation (m) (a) Tabas (b) Naghan (c) Bam
Time (s)

Figure 6. Horizontal displacements of key locations under

earthquake excitation (m) (a) Tabas (b) Naghan (c) Bam
Comparisons have been made between the
displacements of the structure prior to the attainment of
instability, determined from linear and nonlinear
hyperboloid differ slightly because of the small analyses, in order to assess the importance of the
numerical errors encountered, but are negligible nonlinear behaviour of the ring stiffener at the bottom of
compared with the overall dimensions of the tower. It is the tower, the columns with in the structure and the drift
noteworthy that under the Tabas and Bam earthquake of the top of the columns. This is illustrated in Figure 7,
excitation, the displacements at the bottom of the shell which shows the elastic and inelastic displacements of
(A′ and B′) exceed those at the top (A and B). This is the point B′ under excitation by the three earthquakes in
attributable to the effect of the acceleration of the centre question. It can be seen that the nonlinear effects are
of mass of the structure, and to the effect of the loss of quite significant, especially so for the Bam earthquake
base rigidity due to the formation of plastic hinges excitation.
within the columns. The centre of mass of the structure, Figure 8 shows the base shear versus displacement
as modelled, is approximately 36 m above the level of response of point A′ of the columns of the Shazand
the foundation. tower, determined by both linear and nonlinear analysis.

6 Advances in Structural Engineering Vol. 9 No. 3 2006

Saeid Sabouri-Ghomi, Farhad Abedi Nik, Ali Roufegarinejad, Mark A Bradford

Linear (Point A⬘) Nonlinear (Point A⬘)

15000 15000

10000 10000
Base shear (tonne)

5000 5000

0 0
t = 2.66 sec
–5000 –5000

–10000 –10000

–15000 –15000
–0.15 –0.1 –0.05 0 0.05 0.1 0.15 –0.15 –0.1 –0.05 0 0.05 0.1 0.15
Displacement (m) Displacement (m)
(a) Tabas

Linear (Point A ⬘) Nonlinear (Point A )⬘

15000 15000

10000 10000
Base shear (tonne)

5000 5000

0 0

–5000 –5000

–10000 –10000
–0.15 –0.1 –0.05 0 0.05 0.1 –0.15 –0.1 –0.05 0 0.05 0.1
Displacement (m) Displacement (m)
(b) Naghan
Linear (Point A⬘) Nonlinear (Point A )⬘
10000 10000

5000 5000
Base shear (tonne)

t = 2.38 sec
0 0

–5000 –5000

–10000 –10000

–15000 –15000
–0.1 –0.05 0 0.05 0.1 0.15 0.2 0.25 0.3 –0.1 –0.05 0 0.05 0.1 0.15 0.2 0.25 0.3

Displacement (m) Displacement (m)

(c) Bam

Figure 8. Base shear (tonne = 10 kN) vs displacement (m) response for key point A′ using linear and nonlinear analysis

As shown in the figure, the hysteresis curves determined
based on linear analysis are easily enveloped, as
expected for elastic analysis. On the other hand, the
nonlinear response is not bounded with an increase in the
displacement with a decrease in the base shear, and
clearly the nonlinearity of the behaviour that arises as the
hinges develop cannot be ignored in analysis and design
under earthquake excitation. The region contained within
the hysteresis loops is a metric of the energy that is
dissipated, and this energy is higher for thicker hysteretic
regions. It can be seen from Figure 8 that the energy
absorbed in the structure is not large, with a reduction in
the stiffness of the structure taking place accompanied by
large displacements. It is clear that the representative RC
cooling tower does not exhibit desired, stable hysteretic
behaviour under earthquake excitation.
5. STABILITY
A detailed study to determine the distribution of the self
weight of the structure has been performed, and this has
indicated that the ratio of the weight of the foundation to
that of the entire structure is 22.3%, whilst the

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 Numerical Study of the Nonlinear Dynamic Behaviour of Reinforced Concrete Cooling Towers under Earthquake Excitation

(a) 20 In order to undertake the buckling analysis, recourse

18 has been made to the SAP2000 finite element package,
16 in which a buckling analysis is performed sequentially
14 as the plastic hinges form during the relevant
12 earthquake excitation. The elastic buckling load factor
10 for the first buckling mode is shown as a function of
8 time in Figure 9, and it can be seen that the buckling
6 load factor under self weight is eroded significantly
4 from its initial value of 18.52 (which is somewhat
2 higher than typical, VGB 1990) as plastic hinges
0
develop with time. For simplicity, this analysis has
1.5 1.7 1.9 2.1 2.3 2.5 2.7 restricted the location of the plastic hinges to the
Time (s) columns, but in reality it may be possible that the
(b) 20 development of plastic hinges within the hyperbolic
18 shell may be influential on the buckling behaviour. The
16 buckling analysis has also ignored the dynamic effects
14
in the calculation of the buckling load factor, which is
12
clearly unconservative since the effects of the
10
earthquake excitation will be larger when dynamic
8
effects are also included. Figure 9 shows that under
6
these unconservative assumptions the buckling load
4
factor remains greater than unity for the Naghan
excitation, but buckling occurs under the Tabas and
2
Bam earthquake excitations.
0
0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1 1.1 1.2 1.3
Time (s) 6. CONCLUSIONS
(c) 20
The numerical investigation undertaken in this paper
18
has concluded that:
• The position and the sequence of the formation
16
of hinges in the columns depend on the nature of
14
the earthquake record. Plastic hinges, though,
12
form mainly in columns at their junctions with
10
other structural members and the foundations.
8
The plastic hinges within the shell of revolution
6
were the last hinges to form, but they formed
4
after significant damage had developed within
2
the columns.
0
1.5 1.6 1.7 1.8 1.9 2 2.1 2.2 • The inelastic response of the structure due to the
Time (s) formation of plastic hinges reduces the stiffness
of the structure, and consequently decreases
Figure 9. Degradation of buckling load factor with time
the applied base shear and increases the
(a) Tabas (b) Naghan (c) Bam
displacements, when compared with the
response based on elastic assumptions.
contribution of the columns and of the concrete shell as • Prior to the onset of earthquake-induced
a proportion of the total weight are 17.5% and 60.2% instability, the bottom ring stiffener exhibits rigid
respectively. As noted, the centre of mass is located behaviour so that the displacements of the top of
approximately 36 m above the bottom level of the the columns are sensibly equal to each other. The
foundation. The majority of the mass of the structure is upper regions of the shell experienced minor
therefore contained within the RC paraboloid shell, and deterioration, which may have an effect on the
because of the inherent weakness of the columns under meridional and circumferential forces at the top
earthquake excitation that has been demonstrated in this of the shell.
paper, it is instructive to consider the stability of the • The hysteretic loops of the modelled structure
structure. are not an appropriate representation of the

8 Advances in Structural Engineering Vol. 9 No. 3 2006

Saeid Sabouri-Ghomi, Farhad Abedi Nik, Ali Roufegarinejad, Mark A Bradford
degree of energy absorption. The stiffness and
rigidity of the model decrease when the
displacements increase.
• Following the formation of plastic hinges in the
columns due to earthquake excitation, the cooling
tower analysed would collapse under gravity
loading in the Tabas and Bam earthquakes before
the earthquake had finished. Conservatively, the
effects of dynamic and gravity loading were not
included simultaneously in the stability analysis,
so that combining these within the analysis would
make the issue of structural integrity that is
governed by stability even more crucial than that
which was observed without the simultaneous
inclusion of dynamic and gravity loading.
• Research is clearly necessary (and in progress)
to modify the structural design so as to prevent
collapse.
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9
 Numerical Study of the Nonlinear Dynamic Behaviour of Reinforced Concrete Cooling Towers under Earthquake Excitation

Saeid Sabouri-Ghomi is an Associate Professor in Civil Engineering at the KNT

University of Technology in Tehran, Iran. Dr. Sabouri-Ghomi obtained his MSc. from
the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and his PhD from the University of
Cardiff in the UK. His major fields in research are steel and concrete structures,
structural dynamics and earthquake engineering. He is one of the founders of the
Civil Engineering Faculty of KNT University of Technology, and he acted as Head of
Faculty for many years. He has more than 40 papers in journals and conferences as
well as two innovative books on the topic of lateral load resisting systems.

Farhad Abedi Nik is a lecturer in the Civil Engineering group of Sadra Institute of
Higher Education, Iran. He obtained his MSc. from the KNT University of Technology
in Tehran. His research interests are in special structures, and in numerical methods.
He has published some research papers in national and international conferences.

Ali Roufegarinejad is a PhD candidate at The University of New South Wales, and is
an Australian Government International Research Scholar undertaking studies of
buckling in thin-walled stainless steel tubes under the supervision of Professor Mark
Bradford. He obtained his BSc (First Class Honours) in Civil-Structural Engineering
from Tabriz University, Iran, in 1997. He then received his MSc from K.N. Toosi
University of Technology in 2000 where he was supervised by Associate Professor
Saeid Sabouri-Ghomi. In 2003, he was awarded the Chevening Scholarship of The
British Council for one year of research and study at Imperial College in London. His
research interests are mainly in steel and composite steel-concrete structures,
numerical methods, structural mechanics, and in earthquake engineering.

Mark A Bradford is currently an Australian Government Federation Fellow and

Professor of Civil Engineering at The University of New South Wales, where he
holds a UNSW Scientia Chair. Professor Bradford obtained his bachelor degrees and
PhD from The University of Sydney, and his DSc from UNSW. His research
encompasses steel and composite steel-concrete structures in particular, as well as
numerical methods and structural mechanics. Professor Bradford serves on the
editorial and advisory boards of ten journals and is a member of four Standards
Australia committees, including those for steel structures and composite
construction. Included amongst his over 370 publications are twelve books in the
structural engineering discipline.

10 Advances in Structural Engineering Vol. 9 No. 3 2006