ABSTRACT
Observations of damage during numerous historical earthquakes have shown that geotechnical factors can have a strong influence on the performance of man-made and natural structures during earthquakes. The origin of the field of geotechnical earthquake engineering can be traced to the damaging earthquakes in Niigata, Japan and Alaska in 1964. Then, the field experienced significant growth during the rise of the nuclear power industry during the 1960s and 1970s. In recent years, the field has evolved with the rise of the performance-based engineering paradigm for earthquake engineering coupled with the lessons learned from significant earthquakes in California, Japan, Turkey and Taiwan between 1989 and 1999. As a result of this ongoing process, theories and analytical procedures are now available for many of the important problems faced by practicing geotechnical engineers. This chapter provides an overview of these problems and the tools and techniques that are available for their solution.
