Original Article

Structural Health Monitoring

2016, Vol. 15(6) 639649

Dam safety prediction model The Author(s) 2016

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considering chaotic characteristics in DOI: 10.1177/1475921716654963
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prototype monitoring data series

Huaizhi Su1,2, Zhiping Wen3, Zhexin Chen2 and Shiguang Tian4

Abstract
Support vector machine, chaos theory, and particle swarm optimization are combined to build the prediction model of
dam safety. The approaches are proposed to optimize the input and parameter of prediction model. First, the phase
space reconstruction of prototype monitoring data series on dam behavior is implemented. The method identifying
chaotic characteristics in monitoring data series is presented. Second, support vector machine is adopted to build the
prediction model of dam safety. The characteristic vector of historical monitoring data, which is taken as support vector
machine input, is extracted by phase space reconstruction. The chaotic particle swarm optimization algorithm is intro-
duced to determine support vector machine parameters. A chaotic support vector machinebased prediction model of
dam safety is built. Finally, the displacement behavior of one actual dam is taken as an example. The prediction capability
on the built prediction model of dam displacement is evaluated. It is indicated that the proposed chaotic support vector
machinebased model can provide more accurate forecasted results and is more suitable to be used to identify efficiently
the dam behavior.

Keywords
Dam safety, prediction model, support vector machine, chaos theory, particle swarm optimization

Introduction the trained SVM can be used to forecast the coming

The methods in mathematics, mechanics, and infor-
matics are often used to analyze the prototype monitor-
ing data on dam behavior and establish the prediction
model of dam safety. The dam behavior is identified
and assessed with the built model.1,2 In fact, the con-
struction of prediction model is equivalent to a machine
learning problem. The monitoring data series on dam
behavior is taken as the training sample set to imple-
ment the training operation and obtain a learning
machine. Compared to other machine learning meth-
ods, support vector machine (SVM) has some charac-
teristics such as perfect theory, kernel technology,
global optimum, and good generalization ability. It is
more suitable to solve the nonlinear regression analysis
problem with high dimension.38
The prototype monitoring data can reflect the
dynamic dam behavior under the action of environ-
mental and external loads. Furthermore, the remark-
able correlation exists in historical monitoring data on
dam behavior. So, the characteristic vector of historical
monitoring data can be extracted as SVM input and
dam behavior. Some research work has demonstrated
that the prototype monitoring data series on dam beha-
vior has chaotic characteristics.9,10 The unordered
chaotic time series presents a certain regularity, which
is sensitive to initial value. It is difficult to forecast the
long-term behavior according to chaotic time series.
The short-term behavior is certain and predictable.
After the phase space reconstruction of chaotic time
series is implemented, the original rule of chaotic
1
State Key Laboratory of Hydrology-Water Resources and Hydraulic
Engineering, Hohai University, Nanjing, China
2
College of Water Conservancy and Hydropower Engineering, Hohai
University, Nanjing, China
3
Department of Computer Engineering, Nanjing Institute of Technology,
Nanjing, China
4
National Engineering Research Center of Water Resources Efficient
Utilization and Engineering Safety, Hohai University, Nanjing, China
Corresponding author:
Huaizhi Su, State Key Laboratory of Hydrology-Water Resources and
Hydraulic Engineering, Hohai University, Nanjing 210098, China.
Email: su_huaizhi@hhu.edu.cn
640
system can be extracted from the historical data. The
nonlinear model is selected to approximate the dynamic
system characteristics in the reconstructed phase space,
and the behavior within a certain period can be fore-
casted. Considering chaotic characteristics in prototype
monitoring data series on dam safety, this article
adopts the phase space reconstruction technology to
extract the characteristic vector of historical monitoring
data, which is taken as SVM input. The chaotic sup-
port vector machine (CSVM)-based prediction model
of dam safety is studied.
The SVM parameters influence remarkably the gen-
eralization ability of SVM-based model. As the conven-
tional approaches, the gird search method and genetic
algorithm can be used to select the SVM parameters.
However, the gird search method needs to spend larger
calculation and longer operation time. The genetic
algorithm is often very complicated and needs to design
different crossover or mutation modes for different
optimization problems. The particle swarm optimiza-
tion (PSO), which searches the optimal solution
through the individual collaboration, has the advan-
tages such as simple structure and easy implementation.
However, it is difficult to ensure the quality of initial
particles and is easy to fall into local optimal solution
at a later stage. In this article, the chaotic particle
swarm optimization (CPSO) is introduced to obtain the
optimal parameters of SVM model.
Phase space reconstruction and chaotic
characteristics identification of prototype
monitoring data series on dam behavior
Phase space reconstruction method of prototype
monitoring data series
To analyze the chaotic time series, the phase space
reconstruction needs to be implemented in the first
place. It is considered that the evolution characteristic
of any component of one system is determined by other
interactional components and is the comprehensive
reflection of various components interaction. The devel-
opment process of any component implies the informa-
tion on other components of one system. So, the phase
space of one system can be reconstructed by revealing
the implicit information in the component time series.
For the observed components, their observations at the
delay points of some fixed time are regarded as new
components. The new components can be taken to
reconstruct an equivalent phase space.
Assume that x represents the observed component,
x(t) (t = 1, 2, ., N) is a monitoring data series. The
phase space reconstruction can be fulfilled as follows.
The appropriate delay time t and embedding dimension
Structural Health Monitoring 15(6)
m are chosen. According to x(t), t, and m, a new series
is obtained as follows
X t = fxt, xt + t , . . . , xt + m  1t g 1
where t = 1, 2, ., M, M = N 2 (m 2 1)t. This m
dimensional state space, which consists of observed
value and delay time values, is the reconstructed phase
space. Obviously, the determination of delay time t
and embedding dimension m in equation (1) is a key
step of phase space reconstruction.
The delay time t and embedding dimension m are
traditionally determined separately. In fact, the certain
correlation between above two parameters exists. The
quality of phase space reconstruction is affected by
independently choosing appropriate delay time t and
embedding dimension m and especially the determina-
tion of embedding window width t w = (m 2 1)t.
In the C-C method proposed by Kim et al.,11 the
statistics constructed with the correlation integral of
embedding time series is used to describe the correla-
tion of nonlinear time series. The delay time t and
embedding window width tw are estimated, and the
embedding dimension is calculated. The C-C method
has the advantages such as small calculation and easy
operation. A detailed description on the C-C method is
as follows.
Assume that x(n) (n = 1, 2, ., N) represents a mon-
itoring data series which will be taken to carry out the
phase space reconstruction, t is the delay time, and m is
the embedding dimension. The number of phase points
is M = N 2 (m 2 1)t. The number of vector pairs
related with above M points in the phase space is calcu-
lated. The vectors with the distances less than a given
positive number r are called related vectors. In the
reconstructed phase space, the correlation integral of
embedding time series X(i) is defined as the proportion
of related vector pair number in M2 possible matching
pairs, namely
1 X M
C m, N , r, t = ur  kX i  X jk 2
M 2 i, j = 1
where

0, x<0
u x = 3
1, x.0
The time series x(n) (n = 1, 2, ., N) is divided into
t disjoint subsequences with the length of N/t, namely
fx1, xt + 1, x2t + 1, . . .g
fx2, xt + 2, x2t + 2, . . .g
..
.
fxt, xt + t, x2t + t, . . .g
Su et al.
The statistic of each subsequence S(m, N, r, t) is cal-
culated as follows
1X t
S m, N , r, t = fCl m, N =t, r, t
t l=1
Cl 1, N =t, r, tm g 4 common parameters include the Lyapunov exponent
where Cl is the correlation integral obtained by the lth
subsequence.
S(m, N, r, t) reflects the autocorrelation characteris-
tic of time series. If the time series is independent and
identically distributed, then for the certain m and t,
when N!N, S(m, N, r, t) is equal to 0 for all r.
However, the actual time series is finite and there is a
significant correlation. Therefore, S(m, N, r, t) is not
equal to 0 in general. The local maximum time can be
selected when S(m, N, r, t);t is the null point or when
S(m, N, r, t);t shows the minimum changes for all
neighborhood radius r. Under above cases, the points
in phase space are almost uniformly distributed, and
the chaotic trajectory is completely unfolded in phase
space. So the maximum and minimum radiuses r corre-
sponding to S(m, N, r, t) are chosen, and the following
difference is defined
DS m, N , t = maxS m, N , ri , t
  
 min S m, N , rj , t , i 6 j
DS(m, N, t);t can be used to measure the maximum
deviation of S(m, N, r, t) for all neighborhood radius r.
The null points of S(m, N, r, t);t are same for all m
and r, and the minimum values of DS(m, N, t);t are
also same for all m. The delay time t corresponds to the
minimum value among the local maximum times t.
It is indicated that, when 2 < m < 5, s/2 < r < 2s,
and N 500, the good results can be obtained. s is the
standard deviation of time series. According to equa-
tions (4) and (5), the three statistics are defined as
follows
1 X 5 X 4   2. Reconstruct the phase space
S9t = S m, N , rj , t 6
16 m = 2 j = 2
X
5 t = 1, 2, . . . , M :
1
DS9t = DS m, N , t 7
4 m=2
Scor t = jS9tj + DS9t 8 namely
In the C-C method, the delay time t is regarded as
the minimum between two local maximum times t cor-
responding to the first null point of S#(t) and the first
minimum of DS#(t), and the embedding window width
tw is regarded as the time t corresponding to the mini-
mum of Scor(t).
641
Chaotic characteristic identification method of
prototype monitoring data series
Chaotic characteristics of prototype monitoring data
series can be identified by calculating the characteristic
parameters on strange attractor of chaotic signal. The
or largest Lyapunov exponent describing the diver-
gence rate of adjacent track, the correlation dimension
describing the attractor dimension, and the
Kolmogorov entropy reflecting the information fre-
quency. Above three parameters are attractor invar-
iants. In this article, the largest Lyapunov exponent
and correlation dimension are used to identify the
chaotic characteristics of prototype monitoring data
series on dam behavior.
Lyapunov exponent. Chaotic system is sensitive to the ini-
tial value. The slight variation of initial system state
will cause the exponential divergence of system beha-
vior with time, but it will eventually converge to a
strange attractor. Lyapunov exponent is a parameter
describing the divergence rate of adjacent track.
Lyapunov exponentbased method is used to identify
the chaotic characteristics of prototype monitoring
data series according to the diffusion motion of phase
orbit.
5
A chaotic system has at least one Lyapunov expo-
nent which is greater than zero. It is an important fea-
ture distinguishing strange attractor and other
attractors. So, only the maximum Lyapunov exponent
l1 is usually estimated to implement the chaotic identi-
fication of actual dynamic systems with Wolf method,
Jacobian method, and small data setsbased method.12
The calculation steps of small data setsbased method
with small calculation and easy operation can be
described as follows:
1. Determine the delay time t, the embedding dimen-
sion m and the average period p.
X t = fxt, xt + t , . . . , xt + m  1t g
3. Search the nearest point X(t#) of every point X(t)
in the phase space and limit short separation,
dt 0 = minkX t  X t9k, jt  t9j.p 9
^t
where t# = 1, 2, ., M and t6t#.
4. Calculate the distance dt(i) of neighborhood point
for every point X(t) in the phase space after i
642
discrete time steps, namely
dt i = kX t + i  X t9 + ik, i = 1, 2, . . . ,
minM  t, M  t9
5. The geometric significance of the maximum
Lyapunov exponent l1 is to quantify the exponent
divergence of initial closed orbits. So the following
can be known
dt i = dt 0el1 iDt
where Dt is the time interval of monitoring data series.
The following can be obtained using Log function on
both sides of equation (11)
ln dt i = ln dt 0 + l1 iDt, t = 1, 2, . . . , M
Obviously, the maximum Lyapunov exponent l1
can be approximately regarded as the slopes of the
straight lines lndt(i)/Dt;i (t = 1, 2, ., M), which can
be obtained using the least square method, namely
1
yi = hln dt ii
Dt
where \. represents the average value of all t. A linear
area of y(i);i is selected and the least square method is
adopted to generate a regression straight line. The slope
of above straight line is the maximum Lyapunov expo-
nent l1.
Correlation dimension. A key feature of chaotic system is
that it has the strange attractor in the phase space. A
basic mathematical parameter describing the strange
attractor is its dimension. G-P algorithm is extensively
applied to the correlation dimension calculation of above
attractor according to the time series.13,14 The basic prin-
ciple of G-P algorithm is introduced as follows.
After the monitoring data series, x(t) (t = 1, 2, .,
N), is taken to implement the phase space delay recon-
struction, a set of space vectors as follows can be
obtained
X t = fxt, xt + t , . . . , xt + m  1t g,
t = 1, 2, . . . , M
A neighborhood radius r is given and the correlation
integral C(r) can be calculated as follows
1 X M
C r = 2
ur  kX i  X jk
M i, j = 1
Obviously, the calculation results of correlation inte-
gral are related to the value of r. Correlation dimension
D is defined as follows
Structural Health Monitoring 15(6)
ln C r
D = lim 15
r!0 ln r
A double logarithmic curve of lnC(r)lnr can be
10 obtained by giving some certain values of r and calcu-
lating the corresponding correlation integral C(r). The
least square method is adopted to fit an optimal straight
line on above curve. The straight line slope is called cor-
relation exponent.
For a chaotic series, the correlation exponent will be
11 increased with the increase in embedding dimension m,
finally tends to a saturation value. The saturation value
is the correlation dimension D2. For a random series,
the correlation exponent will keep increasing as the
embedding dimension m increases, and there is no
saturation phenomenon. Therefore, the embedding
dimension m is increased gradually and the correspond-
12 ing correlation exponent is calculated. The chaotic
series or random series can be distinguished according
to the saturation phenomenon of calculated correlation
exponent.
CSVM-based prediction model of dam
13 safety
Considering the chaotic characteristics in prototype
monitoring data series on dam behavior, SVM and
chaos theory are combined into chaotic SVM (CSVM),
which is used to build the prediction model of dam
safety.
CSVM input determination
The appropriate delay time t and embedding dimension
m are chosen to implement the phase space reconstruc-
tion of chaotic monitoring data series on dam behavior,
x(t) (t = 1, 2, ., N). The following phase space vector
sequence is obtained
X t = fxt, xt  t , . . . , xt  m  1t g,
t = 1 + m  1t, . . . , N 16
It can be known from Takens embedding theorem
that, as long as the chosen delay time t and embedding
dimension m are appropriate, the trajectory in the
reconstructed phase space is the dynamic equivalence
of original system in the sense of differential homeo-
morphism. So, there is a function relationship as
follows
X t + h = F X t = F fxt, xt  t , . . . , x
14
t  m  1t g 17
where h is the prediction step length.
The change process of X(t)!X(t + h) can reflect the
evolution of original unknown dynamic system. For the
Su et al.
case such as h = 1, the following first component of
X(t + h) can be obtained from equation (17)
xt + 1 = f fxt, xt  t , . . . , xt  m  1t g 18
Obviously, {x(t), x(t 2 t), ., x[t 2 (m 2 1)t]} can
be regarded as the input vector of SVM which is used
to fulfill the regression prediction of x(t + 1).
CSVM parameter selection
The SVM parameter selection has a great influence on
the learning effect and generalization ability of SVM
which is used to carry out the regression analysis.1518
The gird search method is usually used to select the
penalty factor C and the parameter g of radial basis
function (RBF) kernel function. In fact, it searches the
optimal parameter combination from an exhaustive
parameter combination series, which needs to exhaust
long time. Therefore, some intelligent optimization
algorithms such as PSO are combined with SVM to
search the SVM parameters. PSO first initializes ran-
domly a particle group in a search space. The position
of each particle is a solution of optimization problem.
Each particle has a fitness value measuring its perfor-
mance, and there is a speed which decides the flight
direction and distance of each particle. Then, the parti-
cles track the current optimal particle, dynamically
adjust their speeds and positions, and the optimal solu-
tion is found by iteration. In each iteration, the particle
updates itself by tracking two following extremes. One
is the individual extreme pbest, namely, the current
optimal solution found by the particle itself. Another is
the global extreme gbest, namely, the current optimal
solution found by the entire population. Compared
with genetic algorithm, PSO algorithm finds the opti-
mal solution through individual collaboration. The
PSO algorithm has two shortcomings.19 One is that the
initialization process is random, but the quality of each
particle cannot be guaranteed. Another is that it is easy
to fall into the local optimal solution at a later stage.
As an improved PSO, the CPSO can take advantage
of chaotic motion ergodicity to find a particle swarm
with good individual quality when the particle swarm is
initialized. The chaotic disturbance on the particles is
carried out so as to make the solution out of local
extreme interval when the particles are updated.
Logistic mapping is a typical chaotic system, and its
iterative formula can be expressed as follows
zi + 1 = mzi 1  zi , i = 0, 1, 2, . . . , m 2 2, 4
When the control parameters m = 4, 0 < z0 < 1,
logistic is completely in a chaotic state. According to
the chaotic motion characteristics, the optimal search
can be implemented as follows. A set of chaotic
643
variables with same number of optimized variables are
generated. The chaos is added to the optimized vari-
ables with a similar way of signal carrier and the vari-
ables present the chaotic state. At the same time, the
ergodic range of chaotic motion is extended to the
value range of optimized variables. Then, the chaotic
variables are directly taken to search. Because the chao-
tic motion has the characteristics such as randomness,
ergodicity, and sensitivity to initial conditions, the
chaos-based search is better than other random
searches.
The selection on penalty factor C and RBF kernel
function parameter g is equivalent to solving the two-
dimensional (2D) optimization problem as follows
min f x1 , x2
20
s:t: ai <xi <bi , i = 1, 2
where the optimized variable x1 represents the penalty
factor C, the optimized variable x2 represents the para-
meter g of RBF kernel function. The objective function,
namely, the fitness value f, is to average the forecast
mean square errors of k validation sets. Considering
that the big penalty factor C can cause the decrease in
model generalization ability, the penalty factor C
should be controlled as small as possible under the pre-
mise of ensuring a certain prediction accuracy on cross
validation of training set.
The CPSO can be used to select the penalty factor C
and the RBF kernel function parameter g as follows.
The flowchart is shown in Figure 1:
1. Implement the chaotic particle initialization.
 Generate randomly one 2D vector z1 = (z11, z12),
and its components are between 0 and 1. According
to equation (20), zi + 1j = 4zij(1 2 zij), i = 1, 2, .,
N 2 1 and j = 1, 2. N particles, z1, z2, ., zN, can
be obtained.
 Add the components of zi to the optimized variables
with the signal carrier way. xij = aj + (bi 2 aj)zij,
i = 1, 2, ., N and j = 1, 2. N particles, x1, x2, .,
xN, can be generated.
 Calculate the fitness values, fN 3 1, for all particles,
and select m ones with better performance among N
particles to form initial particle swarm xm 3 2. For
above selected m particles, their fitness values fi and
the first components xi1 (namely, penalty factor C)
are both smaller. The initialization speed is vm 3 2
= zeros(m, 2).
 Initialize the individual extreme, pxbest0 = xm 3 2.
19
The corresponding fitness value is pfbest0 = fm 3 1.
Initialize the global extreme, gxbest0, and the corre-
sponding fitness value, gfbest0, according to the fit-
ness values fi and the first components xi1 (namely,
penalty factor C) of m particles.
644
Figure 1. CSVM parameter selection flowchart.
2. Generate randomly one 2D vector u0 = (u01, u02),
and its components are between 0 and 1.
3. For the iteration number k = 1:kmax and the parti-
cle i = 1:m, the following cyclic operations are
implemented.
4. Update the speeds of all particles, which are within
vmax
vki = c0 vk1i + c1 pxbestk1i  xk1i + c2 gxbestk1i  xk1i
21
5. Update the particle position with chaotic
disturbance.
 According to equation (19), u1j = 4u0j(1 2 u0j),
j = 1, 2, obtain u1 = (u11, u12).
 Put each component of u1 to the chaotic distur-
bance range [2b, b] with the signal carrier way,
Dxj = 2b + 2bu1j, j = 1, 2. Obtain the distur-
bance variable Dx = (Dx1, Dx2).
 Let u0 = u1.
 Calculate xki = xk 2 1i + vki, x9ki = xk1i + vki + Dx
and the corresponding fitness values fki, fki9 . If fki9\fki
or jfki9\fki j<e and the first component at the particle
position is x9ki1\xki1 , then update the particle posi-
tion into xki = x9ki and the corresponding fitness value
is fki = fki9 .
6. Update the extreme of individual particle. If fki \
pfbestk 2 1i or fki-pfbestk 2 1i < e and the first
component at the particle position is xki1 \
pxbestk 2 1i1, then the individual extreme of the
particle xi is pxbestki = xki, and the corresponding
fitness value is pfbestki = fki. Otherwise,
pxbestki = pxbestk 2 1i and pfbestki = pfbestk 2 1i.
Structural Health Monitoring 15(6)
7. Update the global extreme of particle swarm. If the
fitness value on individual extreme of the particle
xi is pfbestki \ gfbestk 2 1 or pfbestki-gfbestk
2 1 < e and the first component of individual
extreme is pxbestki1 \ gxbestk 2 1,1, then the global
extreme of particle swarm is gxbestk = pxbestki,
and the corresponding fitness value is gfbestk =
pfbestki. Otherwise, gxbestki = gxbestk 2 1i and
gfbestk = gfbestk 2 1.
8. End the cyclic operations. According to the fitness
values gfbestk and the first components gxbestk1 on
the kmax global extremes, which are obtained in the
kmax iterations, the appropriate penalty factor C
and RBF kernel function parameter g are
determined.
Construction process for prediction model of dam
safety with CSVM
Assume that x(t) (t = 1, 2, ., N) represents a monitor-
ing data series on dam safety. According to the delay
time t and embedding dimension m chosen with the
proposed way, the phase space reconstruction of x(t) is
implemented and the chaotic characteristic is identified.
If the time series is chaotic, a sample set X(t), x(t + 1)},
where t = 1 + (m 2 1)t, ., N 2 1, is constructed.
X(t)2Rm is the input feature vector, which is obtained
according to equation (16). x(t + 1)2R is the output
variable. The first n sets of observed data are taken as
the training samples to implement the training opera-
tion of CSVM and obtain the prediction model of dam
safety.
Example analysis
One roller compacted concrete gravity dam with a max-
imum height of 113.0 m, a crest length of 308.5 m, and
a crest elevation of 179.0 m is taken as an example to
demonstrate the proposed model. This dam (Figure 2)
consists of six dam sections which are numbered 16
from left bank to right bank. The normal storage water
level and the check flood level are 173.00 and 177.80 m,
respectively. The pendulum measurements (Figure 2)
were installed to measure the horizontal displacement
of dam crest and dam body. The monitoring system
was put into operation in October 2002. In this article,
the horizontal displacement along the river of No. 5
dam section crest is analyzed with the proposed
method. Figure 3 shows the time curve of horizontal
displacement measured daily from 1 January 2003 to 31
December 2007. Based on the observations of pendu-
lum measurement, the proposed method is used to
build the prediction model of dam displacement. The
Su et al. 645

Figure 2. Layout of pendulum measurements observing horizontal displacement.

Figure 3. Time curve on observed horizontal displacement of No. 5 dam section crest.

fitting and forecasting ability of built model and con- reconstruction of monitoring data series, namely x(t),
ventional model is compared. t = 1, 2, ., 1825, is implemented. The phase space
vector series is obtained as follows

Phase space reconstruction of monitoring data series

on dam displacement
The key to reconstruct the phase space of monitoring
data series on dam displacement, namely, x(t), t = 1,
2, ., 1825, is to determine the related parameters.
Equations (6)(8) in the mentioned C-C method are
used to determine the delay time t and embedding
dimension m. Figure 4 shows the relation curves
between S#(t)t, DS#(t)t, and Scor(t)t. It can be seen
from Figure 4 that the time when DS#(t) reaches the
first minimum is earlier than that when S#(t) reaches
null point. So, the delay time is regarded as the time
when DS#(t) reaches the first minimum, t = 26. The
embedding window width is taken as the time t corre-
sponding to the minimum of Scor(t), tw = 73. The cal-
culated embedding dimension is m = 4.
According to the delay time t and embedding dimen- Figure 4. Relation curves between S#(t)t, DS#(t)t, and
sion m determined above, the phase space Scor(t)t.
646
Figure 5. Relation curve between y(i) and i.
Figure 6. Relation curve between lnC(r) and lnr.
X t = fxt, xt  26, xt  52, Figure 6. It can be seen from Figure 6 that there are
xt  78g, t = 79, 80, . . . , 1825 22
Chaotic characteristics identification of monitoring
data series on dam displacement
Maximum Lyapunov exponent calculation. The small data
setsbased method is adopted to calculate the maxi-
mum Lyapunov exponent of monitoring data series,
namely, x(t), t = 1, 2, ., 1825. The delay time t and
embedding dimension m determined above are 26 and
4, respectively. y(i) is calculated with equation (13). The
relation curve between y(i) and i can be given as Figure
5. The least square method is used to fit the linear area
of above relation curve between y(i) and i. It can be
known that the straight line slope, namely the maxi-
mum Lyapunov exponent l1, is 0.0087.
Correlation dimension calculation. G-P algorithm is intro-
duced to calculate the correlation dimension of moni-
toring data series, namely, x(t), t = 1, 2, ., 1825. The
phase space is reconstructed under the conditions that
the delay time is t = 26 and the embedding dimension
Structural Health Monitoring 15(6)
Figure 7. Relation curve between d(m) and m.
is m = 1, 2, ., 10. The correlation integrals C(r) are
calculated with equation (14) and the relation curve
between lnC(r) and lnr can be given, which is shown in
obvious straight line segments in 10 curves. The straight
lines are fitted using the least square method and their
slopes, namely, correlation exponents d(m), can be
obtained. Figure 7 shows the relation curve between
d(m) and m. It can be seen from Figure 7 that the corre-
lation exponent increases as the embedding dimension
m increases. When m = 6, it tends to the saturation
value (1.85) which is the correlation dimension D2.
It can be known from above analysis that for the
monitoring data series on dam displacement, x(t),
t = 1, 2, ., 1825, its maximum Lyapunov exponent
l1 is greater than zero, and its correlation dimension
D2 is the fraction. So the chaotic characteristic exists in
the monitoring data series on dam displacement. The
proposed method can be used to build the prediction
model of dam displacement.
CSVM-based prediction model of dam displacement
and its performance analysis
A sample set, {X(t), x(t + 1)}, t = 79, 80, ., 1824, is
constructed, where X(t)2R4 is the input feature vector
obtained according to equation (22) and x(t + 1)2R is
Su et al. 647

Figure 8. Search results on optimal parameters by gird search method.

Table 1. CPSO algorithm parameters.
Parameter Value
Random particle number (N) 50
Chaotic particle number (m) 10
Maximum iteration number (kmax) 10
Maximum particle speed (vmax) 0.6 3 28
Acceleration constant (c1) 1.5 3 rand
Acceleration constant (c2) 1.7 3 rand
Chaotic disturbance range [2b, b] [21, 1]
the output variable. For the 1746 sample points of dam
displacement, the 1382 sample points observed from
2003 to 2006 forms a training set in order to establish
the prediction model of dam displacement, and the 364
sample points observed in 2007 forms a test set in order
to judge the prediction performance of built model.
Model parameters selection. RBF kernel function is
selected and the insensitive loss function parameter is
e = 0.001. The grid search method and the CPSO are
used to determine the penalty factor C and the para-
meter g of RBF kernel function. The ranges of C and g
are both set as 22828. The evaluation indexes of model
performance are taken as the penalty factor C and the
cross validation mean square error (CVMSE). When
the CVMSE difference between two parameter sets is
not more than 1025, the parameter set with smaller C is
better.
The gird search method uses the logarithmic form,
namely, log2 C and log2 g, to construct the gird. The
change step length of log2 C and log2 g is 0.8, namely,
the change step length of C and g is 1.7411. Figure 8
shows the search results on optimal parameters by the
gird search method. The obtained optimal parameters
are that the penalty factor C = 84.4485 and the RBF
kernel function parameter g = 0.0068. The corre-
sponding CVMSE is 0.0026, and the consuming time is
168 s.
CPSO algorithm takes x = (C, g) as the particle,
and CVMSE as the fitness value. Table 1 lists the para-
meters related to CPSO algorithm. The search results
on optimal parameters by CPSO algorithm are shown
in Figure 9. The obtained optimal parameters are that
the penalty factor C = 63.6498 and the RBF kernel
function parameter g = 0.0039. The corresponding
CVMSE is 0.0026, and the consuming time is 88 s.
Prediction model of dam displacement and its
performance. The determined parameters and training
set of CSVM are taken to train CSVM. The
648 Structural Health Monitoring 15(6)

Figure 9. Search results on optimal parameters by CPSO algorithm.

Figure 10. Calculated results of CSVM-based model with optimal parameters searched by CPSO algorithm.

Table 2. Fitting and prediction abilities of two CSVM-based models with optimal parameters searched by CPSO (Model I) and by
gird search method (Model II).

Model Fitting ability Prediction ability Consuming time (s)

Mean square Squared correlation Mean square Squared correlation
error coefficient r2 error coefficient r2

Model I 2.37e25 0.9996 2.36e25 0.9995 168

Model II 2.38e25 0.9996 2.32e25 0.9995 88

CSVM-based prediction model of dam displacement
can be obtained. Figure 10 shows the fitting and pre-
diction results of CSVM-based prediction model with
the optimal parameters searched by CPSO algorithm.
Table 2 lists the evaluation indexes on fitting and pre-
diction performances of two CSVM-based prediction
models with the optimal parameters searched by
CPSO algorithm and gird search method. It can be
seen from Table 2 that two models are well matched
in the fitting and prediction abilities of dam
displacement; however, CPSO algorithm spends less
time than the gird search method on searching the
optimal parameters.
Conclusion
Considering the chaotic characteristics in prototype
monitoring data series on dam behavior, the learning
method of SVM and chaos theory are integrated to
study the establishment problem on prediction model
Su et al.
of dam safety. The algorithms on phase space recon-
struction and CPSO are developed to determine the
input feature vector and parameters of CSVM-based
learning model:
1. Based on the reconstructed phase space of proto-
type monitoring data series on dam behavior, a
method is presented to identify the chaotic char-
acteristics in monitoring data series on dam
behavior.
2. SVM is introduced to build the prediction model
of dam safety. The phase space reconstruction is
implemented to extract the feature vector from the
historical data in prototype monitoring data series
with chaotic characteristics, which is regarded as
SVM input. The CPSO algorithm is adopted to
determine the key parameters of SVM. A CSVM
with optimal input and parameters is proposed to
fulfill the prediction model establishment of dam
safety.
3. The displacement of one actual dam is taken as an
example to verify the modeling efficiency and fore-
casting ability. It is indicated that, because of SVM
key parameters and input vector optimized, the
modeling time is greatly reduced under the condi-
tion of ensuring the forecasting precision. By con-
sidering the chaotic characteristics in prototype
monitoring data series on dam behavior, the pro-
posed CSVM-based model can describe more rea-
sonably the dam structural behavior.
Acknowledgements
The authors thank the reviewers for useful comments and sug-
gestions that helped to improve the paper.
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with
respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this
article.
Funding
The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial sup-
port for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this
article: This research has been partially supported by
National Natural Science Foundation of China (SN:
51579083, 41323001, 51139001, and 51479054), Jiangsu
Natural Science Foundation (SN: BK2012036), the Doctoral
Program of Higher Education of China (SN:
20130094110010), Open Foundation of State Key Laboratory
of Hydrology-Water Resources and Hydraulic Engineering
(SN: 20145027612), the Fundamental Research Funds for the
Central Universities (SN: 2015B25414) and a project funded
by the Priority Academic Program Development of Jiangsu
Higher Education Institutions (SN: 3014-SYS1401).
649
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