Three-dimensional pseudo-dynamic reliability analysis of seismic shield tunnel faces combined with sparse polynomial chaos expansion

To address the seismic face stability challenges encountered in urban and subsea tunnel construction, an efficient probabilistic analysis framework for shield tunnel faces under seismic conditions is proposed. Based on the upper-bound theory of limit analysis, an improved three-dimensional discrete deterministic mechanism, accounting for the heterogeneous nature of soil media, is formulated to evaluate seismic face stability. The metamodel of failure probabilistic assessments for seismic tunnel faces is constructed by integrating the sparse polynomial chaos expansion method (SPCE) with the modified pseudo-dynamic approach (MPD). The improved deterministic model is validated by comparing with published literature and numerical simulations results, and the SPCE-MPD metamodel is examined with the traditional MCS method. Based on the SPCE-MPD metamodels, the seismic effects on face failure probability and reliability index are presented and the global sensitivity analysis (GSA) is involved to reflect the influence order of seismic action parameters. Finally, the proposed approach is tested to be effective by a engineering case of the Chengdu outer ring tunnel. The results show that higher uncertainty of seismic response on face stability should be noticed in areas with intense earthquakes and variation of seismic wave velocity has the most profound influence on tunnel face stability.