International Power, Electronics and Materials Engineering Conference (IPEMEC 2015)

Semi-infinite Domain Artificial Boundary Conditions in Dynamic Analysis

Ye-Dan1,a ,Sun-Yijia2,b,Li-Yawei3,c and Guo-kexing4,d
1
School of Civil Engineering, Chang’an University, Xi’an 710061, China
2
School of Civil Engineering, Chang’an University, Xi’an 710061, China
3China Construction First Group The Second Construction Co.,Ltd.,Beijing 102600,China;
4Tianjin Cement Industry Design and Research Institute Co,Ltd.,Tianjin 300400,China;
a
[email protected], [email protected], [email protected]

Keywords: numerical simulation; semi-infinite domains; viscoelastic boundary; infinite element

boundary.

Abstract: The problem of wave propagation in a semi-infinite medium and its interaction with the
structure was always encountered in the engineering numerical simulation.Artificial boundary
conditions of truncated place in semi-infinite domain is the key to ensure accuracy of the calculation
results.Adopting fixed boundary hypothesis makes system become a closed system,which clearly
contrary to purpose of setting the artificial boundary conditions.Based on ABAQUS software,fixed
boundary,viscous boundary, viscoelastic boundary, infinite element boundary and remoted boundary
were set respectively,to study vibration response of the simple semi-infinite domain.Results show
that under the condition of simple elastic medium,viscoelastic boundary model can get close to the
results of actual situation, and also has the advantages of the simple operation, high precision and
good stability.

1 Introduction
When the finite element method is used to solve wave scattering problems in earthquake
engineering, the finite computational area should be truncated from the semi-infinite space. The
method that cut off the boundary is one of the most direct and efficient technique for modeling a
semi-infinte far field in the vibration response analysis of subway station,tunnel and other
underground structures. Using simple fixed boundary condition, will makes the whole system is
closed and the pulse wave will be reciprocating reflection on the fixed boundary,causing the
distortion of simulation[1].
In recent years, in order to eliminate the wave reflection,there have been lots of related scholars
come up with a variety of artificial boundary conditions, such as the remoted boundary,the infinite
element artificial boundary, the viscous-spring artificial boundary, paraxial approximation boundary
and transmitting boundary, etc[2,3].
Based on ABAQUS software,fixed boundary, viscous boundary, viscoelastic boundary , infinite
element boundary and remoted boundary were set respectively,to study vibration response of the
simple semi-infinite domain.Finally,the viscoelastic boundary model method was verified that the
viscoelastic boundary has multiple advantages such as being simple technology processing, low
computational cost and high precision,.

2 The boundary conditions

2.1 Remoted boundary condition
When considering the spread of the infinite domain wave, the boundary of the transmission
medium is infinite.But restricted by calculation in the actual amount of calculation, we have to
artificial truncate infinite domain to establish finite element model.Using remoted boundary
condition when simulating the infinite domain,the artificial boundary needs to get far away,to make
the reflected wave not reach the near field area in the study time which was studied,and to reduce the

© 2015. The authors - Published by Atlantis Press 381

reflected wave disturbance to the structural dynamic response.So remoted boundary distance should
satisfy（1）[4].
D≥0.5vt （1）
Where D represents distance of border to observation point,v represents the compression wave
velocity of soil medium,t represents the record duration of vibration wave.Although amount of
calculation of remoted boundary model is large,but remoted boundary has advantages of simple
processing technology and high precision compared with the viscoelastic boundary and infinite
element boundary.
2.2 Viscoelastic boundary condition
Lysmer, first proposed the concept of viscous boundary; Considering accuracy of viscous artificial
boundary is not high and has faults such as low frequency drift instability, Liu Jingbo established a
two-dimensional artificial viscoelastic boundary on the basis of viscous boundary and cylindrical
wave equation[5,6], that is damping and spring seted on the border to absorb energy which radiate
outward in the process of system vibration,as shown in figure 1. In polar coordinates, using
cylindrical wave hypothesis can deduced the relationship between the velocity and stress or the
relationship between the displace and stress in the radius of R of two-dimensional scattering wave .
G ∂ω ( R, t )
t ( R, t ) = − ω ( R, t ) − ρ cs (2)
2R ∂t

Artificial Boundary Condition

K

The point of Tangential Spring stiffness

boundary and damping

Tangential Spring stiffness

and damping
C
K C

Fig 1 Spring-damper system

where ρ is medium density, c represents the shear wave velocity in the medium,and G is shear
modulus .Spring stiffness and damping of the normal or tangential on the border,which are given as:
G G
K BN = a N , C BN = ρc p （3）; K BT = aT , C BT = ρcs （4）
R R
Where K represents spring stiffness ; G is shear modulus of medium; R represents the distance
from waves to artificial boundary;C is damping coefficient.Lots of research data show that
viscoelastic artificial boundary has good convergence.When the a values from 0.35 to 0.65 or from
0.8 to 1.2, good results can be obtained[7].
2.3 The infinite element boundary condition
Concept of infinite element boundary,was put forward by R.ungless[8],which has been widely used
in the study of infinite domain through constant development.Damping was introduced in infinite
element dynamic analysis theory to absorb radiation energy of wave,so that effect of the wave
reflection on the analysis region can be ignored.ABAQUS has considered the damping Settings as
above which can be directly use[9].
Infinite element boundary settings in ABAQUS that far point and near point of the infinite element
just represent the extension direction of the infinite unit, and its size had no effect on the calculated
results of finite element area.Serial number of node in Infinite element should be consistent with
entity unit,numbering nodes should press anti-clockwise rules.

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 A

Meanwhile, make ensure that first plane should be

the connecting face of finite element and infinite element.As shown in figure 2, the face of the
nodes1and 2 should connect with finite element,and the infinite element unit extension direction
cannot intersect, As the side 1-3 and 2-4 shown in figure 2 .

CINPS4
far points 3 4 3 4
CINPE4
near points1 2 1 2

Fig 2 Node layout-error

3 Example analysis
3.1 Material indicators of medium
Semi-infinite domains is a single elastic medium.Typical physical and mechanical parameters of
soil was selected and finite element analysis model was established in this study,to make the
calculation results close to the actual situation.The density of medium is 2t/m3.Young's modulus is
50000000 Pa; The equivalent wave speed is 250 m/s; poisson's ratio is 0.3; Rayleigh damping a =
0.616,β= 0.000312.
3.2 Numerical analysis model of ABAQUS
In order to analysis the influence of different artificial boundary conditions to dynamic
response analysis of the subway underground structure,to simplify the semi-infinite domains medium
to two-dimensional plane strain model.Build a analysis model whose size is 100m*50m,mesh size is
1 m.Bottom and side use viscoelastic boundary, viscous boundary and infinite element boundary and
fixed boundary one by one.Meanwhile,A remoted boundary model which has 500m*500m size was
set,and use its solution as the standard solution.
spring and damping components on the normal and tangential of boudary surfacewas set up
lrespectively on boudary surface of viscoelastic boundary mode,distance R from waves to artificial
boundary point was the average distance from point A to bottom(R = 32 m);Surface of Infinite
element boundary model use quadrilateral plane strain unit infinite element to simulate (CINPE4),Its
extension points to observation direction which is away from near field;Fixed boundary model with
fixed boundary conditions on the ground, the side impose horizontal constraints , the vertical is
free.Analysis model of artificial boundary conditions are shown in figure 3 ~ 6.

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 3.3 Dynamic response analysis
On the surface of model applied half sine pulse wave, which time is 0.5 s, amplitude is 0.1 g,
load time history is shown in figure 7.When inputing vibration on surface on model,we can not
directly input acceleration or velocity , because it make the boundary be equal to the fixed
boundary.Release the displacement constraints of bottom boundary which make earthquake input
convert into equivalent force input.To sum up, the vertical input no attenuation P wave, the total load
for the need to impose [7]:
FBN (t ) = −2 ρc p ui (5)

Fig.7 Wave Loading

Vibration response time history figure of observation points A, B and C of each model was
selected and analysised,displacement time histories of each point as shown in figure 8.

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 0.004 0.004 0.004

0.002 0.002 0.002

0.000 0.000 0.000

-0.002 -0.002 -0.002

-0.004

displacement
-0.004

displacement
-0.004
displacement

-0.006 -0.006 -0.006

-0.008 -0.008 -0.008

fixed boundary fixed boundary
-0.010 fixed boundary -0.010 -0.010
infinite element boundary infinite element boundary
infinite element boundary viscoelastic boundary
-0.012 -0.012 -0.012 viscoelastic boundary
viscoelastic boundary viscous boundary
-0.014 viscous boundary -0.014 viscous boundary
remoted boundary -0.014
remoted boundary remoted boundary
-0.016 -0.016 -0.016
-0.018 -0.018 -0.018
0.0 0.5 1.0 1.5 2.0 2.5 0.0 0.5 1.0 1.5 2.0 2.5 0.0 0.5 1.0 1.5 2.0 2.5
time(s) time(s) time(s)

（a）point A （b）point B （c）point C

Fig 8 Displacements of observe points

The pulse wave reflected back to top surface and reflected repeatedly without go through the
bottom border within the scope of computing and 2.5 s of computing time under fixed boundary
condition.The conclusion that pulse wave always reflected repeatedly without go through the border
within the scope of computing and pulse always reflected repeatedly till energy absorbed by the
medium where there is damping medium was derivated.Under remoted condition,wave didn’t
reflected in the calculation time because its model had enough big size and the communication
process of wave in medium was consistent with the actual situation in infinite domain as well as
accuracy solution.So the conclusion of the remoted boundary condition can be used as a standard
solution.
In viscous boundary model, wave energy almost completely absorbed by the viscous boundary in
the bottom edge after pulse reached the bottom surface ,and model simulates the wave across the
border successfully, but it has the whole drift phenomenon aobviously. Low frequency drift is the
fault of viscous boundary, which limits its scope of application.
The conclusion that boundary played the role of consumpting and truncating boundary energy,
reducing interference of wave reciprocating and simulating the wave across the boundary without low
frequency drift was knew after studying the viscoelastic boundary model and infinite element
boundary model. But the results of viscoelastic boundary was far closer to remoted boundary and had
a higher accuracy compared with infinite element boundary.
From the calculation results of contrast analysis of above five kinds of different artificial boundary
condition model shows that reflected wave had serious interference on calculation results when
treated with fixed boundary n the infinite domain truncation surface; Viscoelastic boundary exists the
disadvantage of low frequency drift;Viscoelastic boundary and infinite element boundary can better
simulate the spread characteristic of the input wave in the infinite domain and they are more
convenient to model, easier to implement in ABAQUS.

4 The result analysis

The simple elastic medium in semi-infinite domainwas set as the research object, based on
nonlinear finite element analysis software platform of ABAQUS ,the semi-infinite domain numerical
simulation in the choice of artificial boundary was studied. Dynamic response of different artificial
boundary condition model has carried on the contrast research through numerical simulation.draw
these conclusions:
(1) Numerical example results show that pulse wave reflected repeatedly in the truncated area
which has serious interference on results when the fixed boundary are adopted to simulate the infinite
domain medium to truncated boundary in the analysis of the dynamic responses in the semi-infinite
domain,so the results of numerical simulation is not good.
(2) Using remoted boundary condition to simulate semi-infinite domain under the conditions of
boundary distance is greater than the reflectionless critical value and reflection waves didn’t reach
the near field area on the time of analysis can reduce adverse effect of reflection interference and
make numerical simulation result accord with the wave propagation in actual situation of the infinite

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domain ;But when the calculation of remoted boundary condition model is large,remoted boundary
condition model isn’t suitable for implementing because of its high calculating cost.
(3) Using viscous boundary exists the phenomenon of low frequency instability, its use is
restricted.
(4) Using viscoelastic boundary and infinite element boundary conditions, can reduce the wave
reflection, to simulate the wave propagation in the infinite domain media reality, finally get close to
results of remoted boundary condition. Also found that compared with the infinite element
boundaries, viscoelastic boundary far closer to analysis results of the remoted boudary,and has good
precision as well as the more simple modeling work.

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