Probabilistic Evaluation of CPT-based Seismic Soil Liquefaction Potential: Towards the Integration of Interpretive Structural Modeling and Bayesian Belief Network

Abstract

This paper proposes a probabilistic graphical model that integrates interpretive structural modeling (ISM) and Bayesian belief network (BBN) approaches to predict CPT-based soil liquefaction potential. In this study, an ISM approach was employed to identify relationships between influence factors, whereas BBN approach was used to describe the quantitative strength of their relationships using conditional and marginal probabilities. The proposed model combines major causes, such as soil, seismic and site conditions, of seismic soil liquefaction at once. To demonstrate the application of the propose framework, the paper elaborates on each phase of the BBN framework, which is then validated with historical empirical data. In context of the rate of successful prediction of liquefaction and non-liquefaction events, the proposed probabilistic graphical model is proven to be more effective, compared to logistic regression, support vector machine, random forest and naïve Bayes methods. This research also interprets sensitivity analysis and the most probable explanation of seismic soil liquefaction appertaining to engineering perspective.