Global sensitivity analysis for seismic performance of shear wall with high-strength steel bars and recycled aggregate concrete

In terms of bearing lateral loads, a reinforced concrete shear wall (SW) is one of the most crucial structural elements in structures. Despite their significance, recent experimental research and post-earthquake surveys have exposed the inadequate safety margins of the SWs. Significant SW components cannot be accurately identified due to the absence of empirical and mechanistic models. This study introduces a novel paradigm for assessing the SW's crucial elements by using two consecutive modeling strategies. Initially, a finite element model is calibrated to mimic one of the laboratory-experimented SW structures. Then, deep residual neural networks (DRNNs) for non-parametric techniques are used to enhance the Abaqus software prediction skills and comprehensively understand the input parameters' influence on the selected SW structure's displacement value. The suggested DRNNs' design uses residual shortcuts (i.e., connections) that skip several levels in the deep network structure in order to address the issue of training with high accuracy. A thorough global sensitivity analysis (GSA) is done using the Latin Hypercube Simulation. Three distinct GSA techniques are used to emphasize the influence of each input variable on the amount of displacement in real-world applications while limiting the risk of result misinterpretation owing to interactions between input variables. In each GSA approach, an effort would be made to rank, filter, or map the input variables. The performance metrics of the DRNNs prediction models lend confidence to the GSA's results. The diameter of steel stirrups is reported to be the most significant component in the SW structure, while SW's displacement is more sensitive to higher and lower values of the lateral load domain.