Seismic waves and seismic barriers

The basic idea of seismic barrier is to protect an area occupied by a building or a group of buildings from seismic waves. Depending on nature of seismic waves that are most probable in a specific region, different kinds of seismic barriers are suggested. For example, vertical barriers resembling a wall in a soil can protect from Rayleigh and bulk waves. The FEM simulation reveals that to be effective, such a barrier should be (i) composed of layers with contrast physical properties allowing “trapping” of the wave energy inside some of the layers, and (ii) depth of the barrier should be comparable or greater than the considered seismic wave length. Another type of seismic barrier represents a relatively thin surface layer that prevents some types of surface seismic waves from propagating. The ideas for these barriers are based on one Chadwick’s result concerning non-propagation condition for Rayleigh waves in a clamped half-space, and Love’s theorem that describes condition of non-existence for Love waves. The numerical simulations reveal that to be effective the length of the horizontal barriers should be comparable to the typical wavelength.