Dr Zuhal Ozdemir
Department of Civil and Structural Engineering
Lecturer in Structural Engineering


+44 114 222 5419
Full contact details
Department of Civil and Structural Engineering
Room F121
Sir Frederick Mappin Building (Broad Lane Building)
Mappin Street
Sheffield
S1 3JD
- Profile
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My work helps to protect structures and their inhabitants in the event of an earthquake, by ensuring construction regulations take into consideration the seismic response of buildings, and the correct mitigation measures are in place.
Dr Zuhal Ozdemir
Dr Zuhal Ozdemir obtained her PhD in 2010 from Kandilli Observatory (Turkey) and the University of Lille (France).
She then joined the Structural Mechanics Division of Katholieke Universiteit Leuven as a postdoctoral researcher. She joined our Department as a research associate, before becoming a Lecturer in 2012.
Over the past ten years she has worked on interdisciplinary research projects dealing with the dynamics of structures and materials.
Her main expertise is in earthquake engineering, nonlinear FEA (Finite Element Analysis), structural dynamics, high strain rate testing of materials and the static and dynamic behaviour of cellular solids.
Research Themes
- Research interests
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One area of Zuhal’s research focuses on the assessment of the dynamic response of materials and structures under earthquake and impact loads using numerical methods.
She closely works with the members of our Blast Engineering Research group to conduct dynamic tests on materials to characterise their response under high amplitude and short duration loading conditions, and then she models the response numerically to validate experimental results.
She devises analytical solutions to develop simple design methodologies for materials when subjected to high dynamic loads. This work is applied in earthquake and impact engineering; in earthquake events, buildings can be subject to seismic pounding, which can cause serious damage to the structures and pose danger to inhabitants.
Zuhal numerically models this kind of impact response so that building regulations can be written to define the distances between structures, and mitigation techniques can be suggested.
Zuhal also researches the behaviour of irregular structures with complex geometries in plan and elevation. Irregular structures like L or T-shaped buildings have more damage potential than the regular, symmetrical ones, so Zuhal’s work helps to suggest building code recommendations about the influence of irregularities on the seismic response of buildings, and what kind of mitigation guidelines should be implemented.
- Publications
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Journal articles
- Time domain homogenisation of elastic and viscoelastic metamaterials. Mechanics of Time-Dependent Materials.
- Accurate prediction of cyclic hysteresis behaviour of RBS connections using Deep Learning Neural Networks. Engineering Structures, 247, 113156-113156.
- Development of more accurate cyclic hysteretic models to represent RBS connections. Engineering Structures, 245, 112899-112899.
- More efficient design of reduced beam sections (RBS) for maximum seismic performance. Journal of Constructional Steel Research, 183, 106728.
- Seismic performance evaluation of deficient steel moment-resisting frames retrofitted by vertical link elements. Structures, 26, 724-736. View this article in WRRO
- A practical probabilistic earthquake hazard analysis tool: case study Marmara region. Bulletin of Earthquake Engineering. View this article in WRRO
- Energy absorption in lattice structures in dynamics: Nonlinear FE simulations. International Journal of Impact Engineering, 102, 1-15. View this article in WRRO
- Energy absorption in lattice structures in dynamics: Experiments. International Journal of Impact Engineering, 89, 49-61. View this article in WRRO
- On backward dispersion correction of Hopkinson pressure bar signals. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society A: Mathematical, Physical and Engineering Sciences, 372(2023), 20130291-20130291.
- Numerical evaluation of the dynamic response of pipelines to vibrations induced by the operation of a pavement breaker. Soil Dynamics and Earthquake Engineering, 44, 153-167.
- Numerical evaluation of nonlinear response of broad cylindrical steel tanks under multidimensional earthquake motion. Earthquake Spectra, 28(1), 217-238.
- Neural networks approach for characterisation of viscoelastic polymers. Canadian Journal of Chemical Engineering, 89(5), 1303-1310.
- A refined formula for the allowable soil pressure using shear wave velocities. Open Civil Engineering Journal, 5(1), 1-8.
- Allowable bearing pressure in soils and rocks through dynamic wave velocities. Soil Mechanics and Foundation Engineering, 47(4), 143-152.
- FSI methods for seismic analysis of sloshing tank problems. Mecanique et Industries, 11(2), 133-147.
- Application of nonlinear fluid-structure interaction methods to seismic analysis of anchored and unanchored tanks. Engineering Structures, 32(2), 409-423.
- Seismic technique to determine the allowable bearing pressure in soils and rocks. WIT Transactions on the Built Environment, 104, 253-263.
- Seismic technique to determine the allowable bearing pressure for shallow foundations in soils and rocks. Acta Geophysica, 57(2), 400-412.
- Allowable bearing capacity of shallow foundations based on shear wave velocity. Geotechnical and Geological Engineering, 24(1), 203-218.
- Seismic amplification at Avcilar, Istanbul. Engineering Structures, 24(5), 661-667.
Chapters
- Modelling of Earthquake Hazard and Secondary Effects for Loss Assessment in Marmara (Turkey), Springer Natural Hazards (pp. 67-81). Springer Singapore
- Numerical Simulation of Liquid Sloshing in Tanks, Computational Methods in Applied Sciences (pp. 49-79). Springer International Publishing
Conference proceedings papers
- Case studies: A rapid technique to determine allowable bearing pressure. Geotechnical Special Publication(175) (pp 66)
Website content
Preprints
- Probabilistic seismic hazard assessment framework for Uganda:
A stochastic modelling approach, Research Square Platform LLC.
- Probabilistic Seismic Risk Assessment Framework: Case study Adapazari, Turkey, Research Square Platform LLC.
- Time domain homogenisation of elastic and viscoelastic metamaterials. Mechanics of Time-Dependent Materials.
- Research group
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Concrete Structures
Blast & Impact
Earthquake Engineering Group
- Professional activities and memberships
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- Eiffel excellence scholarship of the French Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs 2008 - 2009.
- Co-investigator of two Newton Fund projects
- Potential PhD offerings
Unfortunately I am not seeking any PhD Students at this time, however please contact me if you are interested in doing a project in my research area.