In many studies, the alternative load path method (APM) has been used for progressive collapse analysis. In this method, one or several columns of the building are removed and the building response is investigated. This method ignores the initial local failure cause of building and this can affect the structural response. Investigation of ignoring the initial local failure cause of steel braced...

The initial consolidation settlement process of saturated cohesive soils has been one of the most important issues to geotechnical engineers especially in important and sensitive structures based which are located on saturated clay layer with high thickness.  In dealing with initial consolidation settlement process and reducing its negative and destructive consequences, a number of solutions ha...

Twin and family studies establish the foundation for studying the genetic, environmental and cultural transmission effects for phenotypes. In this work, we make use of the well established statistical methods and theory for mixed models to assess cultural transmission in twin and family studies. Specifically, we address two critical yet poorly understood issues: the model identifiability in ass...

Correlations between relatives were determined for systolic and diastolic blood pressure. The correlations decrease as age differences between relatives increase in a Norwegian sample with 43,751 parent-offspring pairs, 19,140 pairs of siblings, and 169 pairs of twins. A simple biometric model specifying only age-specific genetic additive effects and environmental effects fitted well to correla...