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Proschema: A Matlab application for processing

strong motion records and estimating
earthquake engineering parameters

Article in Computers & Geosciences · July 2010

DOI: 10.1016/j.cageo.2009.09.020 · Source: DBLP

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 ARTICLE IN PRESS
Computers & Geosciences 36 (2010) 977–986

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Computers & Geosciences

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/cageo

Proschema: A Matlab application for processing strong motion records

and estimating earthquake engineering parameters$
M. Segou n, N. Voulgaris
Department of Geophysics–Geothermics, Faculty of Geology and Geoenvironment, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Panepistimioupoli Zografou,
15784 Athens, Greece

a r t i c l e in fo abstract

Article history: Strong motion records are the original input data for earthquake engineering studies and earthquake
Received 31 March 2009 resistant building codes. Records originating from both, analogue and modern digital instruments
Received in revised form should be subjected to processing in order to derive credible engineering parameters, such as spectral
3 July 2009
ordinates. A number of processing procedures have been proposed by many researchers through the
Accepted 14 September 2009
past few decades; the goal, however, is always the same, identification and removal of noise and
performing necessary adjustments related to the operating instrument or the record’s quality. A careful
Keywords: inspection of previous processing schemes and the design of several development tests related to major
Corrected time series processing steps proved to be helpful in determining the necessary features that the presented software
Response spectra
should include. These have been incorporated in a Matlab application in order to produce a reliable and
Seismology
user-friendly interface giving the researcher several options on major processing steps. It is noteworthy
Smc format
CDMG format that this computer program can be used either as an interactive process tool when individual record
European strong motion database format processing corresponds to the researcher’s needs or, for processing a vast number of records without
user supervision and even through a scheduled task.
& 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction Briefly, Proschema supports filter implementation in order to

Software packages capable to address the need for strong
motion record processing belong to two main categories; they are
either a product of a seismological instrument provider company,
which in several cases do not incorporate the latest advances in
digital signal processing, or a non-commercial research product.
Proschema belongs clearly to the second category since the
objective behind its development has been to provide the user, a
seismologist or an engineer, with the necessary ground motion
parameters, through a prism of innovation regarding processing
and computational techniques.
In case the derived spectral parameters are to be used in
earthquake engineering research the processing scheme is of
fundamental importance since the effort is twofold; to remove
the noise in periods of interest and to protect the actual frequency
content of the record from the application of unnecessary
severe filters.
During the processing of any strong motion record several
actions are better carried out either in the time or frequency
domain; this criterion has been fundamental during Proschema
development.
$
Code available from server at http://www.iamg.org/CGEditor/index.htm
n
Corresponding author. Tel.: + 30 210 7274206; fax: + 30 210 7274878.
E-mail addresses: msegou@geol.uoa.gr (M. Segou),
voulgaris@geol.uoa.gr (N. Voulgaris).
remove high and low frequency noise by applying carefully
designed filters and inspection of the corrected acceleration,
velocity and displacement time series, calculation of elastic
response spectra in terms of pseudo spectral acceleration, velocity
and displacement for basic damping values, and computation of
other spectral ground motion measures independent of the sensor
orientation (Boore et al., 2006). The user can also estimate
earthquake engineering parameters such as peak ground motion
parameters, effective peak acceleration and velocity, response
spectrum intensity, acceleration spectrum intensity as well as
cumulative absolute velocity, root-mean squared acceleration and
Arias intensity.
The user can be either involved in an interactive process
by providing all necessary choices, developing a personal
standardized procedure, or perform automatic processing based
in predefined choices.
The structure of the paper follows the description of the items
on the main menu bar of Proschema in order to familiarize the
reader with the presented software.
2. Strong motion record processing with Proschema
This manuscript provides a thorough description of the
features supported by Proschema; but the user can also find
additional documentation, some theoretical aspects as well as a

0098-3004/$ - see front matter & 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.cageo.2009.09.020
 ARTICLE IN PRESS
978 M. Segou, N. Voulgaris / Computers & Geosciences 36 (2010) 977–986
user guide in the Proschema User Manual (included with the
software) together with useful suggestions about strong motion
processing.
2.1. Supported data formats
Proschema supports importing strong motion raw data in
several formats such as Cosmos version 1.10, and 1.20 smc files
(COSMOS Strong Motion Data Format, 2001), the format of the
European Strong motion Database, as well as CDMG format
(Shakal and Huang, 1985). Since several networks for convenience
in distribution form multicomponent records derived from the
concatenation of single component smc format files (COSMOS
Strong motion Record Format, 2001) a supplementary option
regarding the aforementioned files has been incorporated in the
software. Additionally, the user can import seismometer data in
SAC binary format and proceed with processing and calculation of
response spectra and engineering parameters (Clinton and
Heaton, 2002); but caution is advised since the user should
provide instrument corrected (Havskov and Alguacil, 2004)
velocity time series in this case.
There are however two specific formats, referred as NOA and
ITSAK, used by Greek providers of strong motion data, that even
though they bear characteristics of other standard formats they
are highly irregular due to the existence of many spacing errors
and non-standarized format requiring the implementation of
special scripts to address this inhomogeneity. A number of
utilities simplifying the conversion between formats can be also
found in the software package for third party usage.
For reasons of minimizing computer storage requirements
Proschema keeps both uncorrected and processed time series,
their corresponding spectra and estimated parameters in mat
Matlab binary files in the form of a standardized Matlab structure.
The aforementioned .mat files can be also loaded into Proschema
if the user wishes to reprocess or view the corrected or raw time
series once again.
Before importing raw data the user can also visually inspect
strong motion records in order to decide which should be further
processed. After importing a strong motion record the user may
opt to review earthquake and station metadata as well as
available processing features.
2.2. Time and frequency domain processing
As it was briefly mentioned in the introduction Proschema
software supports actions carried out in the time and frequency
domain. Several actions such as the construction of an equally
sampled time series, performing re-sampling techniques, or
instrument and baseline adjustment can be thought as time
domain related processing but when it comes to mathematical
integration or the implementation of a previously designed filter,
frequency domain related processing is advisable. An analytical
description of the features related with Time and Frequency
Domain Processing serve the purpose of informing the reader
about Proschema capabilities.
2.2.1. Time domain processing
Time domain processing is related to the first processing steps
including the construction of an equally spaced time series, the
removal of the records’ mean, the application of re-sampling
techniques and performing necessary adjustments which are
referred for many years as instrument and baseline correction.
The user is encouraged to inspect the raw time series since the
existence of spurious spikes appears to be a common problem
that should be dealt within the pre-processing stage. The
algorithm used for identification and removal of spikes has two
stages; taking into consideration the severity of the problem
while at the same time protecting the original information that
the raw time series provides. During the first stage spike
identification is accomplished by a running window with
overlapping segments, tracking unexpected exceedances of a
threshold acceleration, which is re-computed for each window.
The peaks indentified earlier as spikes are replaced with an
average amplitude value, between preceding and following
samples. In cases where spurious spikes remain, a second stage
of spike removal can be implemented. At this point the part of
the signal that does not contain spurious spikes is protected from
the de-spiking effort.
In a number of cases uncorrected strong motion records do not
correspond to equally sampled time series. In order to solve this
problem equally sampled series are constructed with sampling
interval equal to the minimum digitization time step of the
original time series. If the minimum interval tends to be very
close to zero then the sampling interval equals the average of
digitization time steps.
An additional interesting feature is related with the removal of
the mean of the user-defined pre-event segment of digital strong
motion records.
The application of re-sampling techniques, such as over-
sampling and decimation of a time series, is provided in order
to change the initial sample rate. Proschema implements
resampling by employing a flexible public-domain resampling
algorithm, found in MATGPR software (Tzanis, 2006) described in
detail in Smith and Gosset (1984). According to the theory of ideal
bandlimited interpolation during sampling rate conversion the
problem is to correctly compute signal values at arbitrary
continuous times from a set of discrete time samples of the
signal amplitude. After considerable research has been devoted to
the problem of interpolating discrete points the method followed
in order to reconstruct the re-sampled time series uses a cardinal
sine function evaluated at specified times. According to Karl
(1989) changing the sampling rate without previous oversam-
pling can lead to significant loss of higher frequency content of
the strong motion record. The degree and method of up-sampling
has been investigated through development tests by accepting
minimum impact on the original strong motion record as the
appropriate criterion for choosing the method of interpolation
and the degree of re-sampling. The default oversampling supports
an intermediate sampling rate at 600 samples-per-second by
cardinal sine interpolation (Karl, 1989) whereas before down-
sampling, at 200SPS, a low-pass filter is implemented in
preparation of decimation for ensuring that no aliasing occurs in
the decimated data. The choice of arbitrary oversample and
decimation allows the user to define the desired degree of
up-sampling and decimation.
Instrument adjustment is performed by a second order
differential equation representing the motion of a single degree
of freedom, damped, harmonic oscillator which is common-
practice since the late 70s (Hudson, 1979). Since most of the
available strong motion databases incorporate both digital and
analogue records, instrument adjustment should be performed
when needed. Although strong motion records from this kind of
analogue instruments suffer artificial high frequency noise due to
hand digitization (Trifunac et al., 1999) in most cases, especially
when the natural frequency of the accelerograph is less than
20 Hz, instrument adjustment should not be avoided. Develop-
ment tests showed that in the case of an analogue instrument
with natural frequency of 17 Hz the lower frequency adjusted
is of the order of 10.5–12 Hz; pointing out the importance of
performing instrument adjustment (Fig. 1). The suggested process
can adjust for the instrument response to frequencies reaching up
 ARTICLE IN PRESS
M. Segou, N. Voulgaris / Computers & Geosciences 36 (2010) 977–986
Fig. 1. Influence of performing instrument adjustment. Fourier amplitude spectrum of an uncorrected acceleration time series against the spectrum of an instrument
adjusted time series of a typical analogue accelerograph with natural frequency 17 Hz. Instrument adjustment begins for frequencies significantly lower than nominal
frequency of instrument.
to a quarter of the Nyquist frequency (Boore and Bommer, 2005)
so the user is encouraged, in case of analogue recording, to
provide a 200SPS original frequency in order to compensate, at
least partially, for the analogue instrument’s deficiency to record
strong motion near its nominal natural frequency.
Baseline adjustment involves a quadratic fit to the velocity
time series which is then applied to the acceleration time series; a
simplification of the procedure formerly proposed by Graizer
(1979).
2.2.2. Frequency domain processing
The frequency domain processing holds the most significant
part of any processing scheme since it involves frequency
filtering.
Primary inspection of the Fourier amplitude spectrum of the
uncorrected acceleration, velocity and displacement time series
provide an evaluation tool for the frequency content of the record.
Mathematical calculations such as integration, in order to
obtain velocity time series, are carried out in the frequency
domain to produce more stable results. Taking into consideration
the invertibility of the Fourier transform, according to Parseval’ s
theorem, the acceleration time series can be represented through
its Fourier transform. Extending the above, the integration of a
sinusoidal input signal in the frequency domain corresponds to
the convolution with the frequency response of the perfect
integration operator which is 1/io whereas for differentiation
the frequency response of the operator is just the inverse of the
integrator, simply io (Karl, 1989).
Another tool provided to evaluate the record’s frequency
content supports the visual inspection of the Fourier amplitude
spectrum of the uncorrected acceleration time series of recordings
corresponding to the same earthquake, selected by means of
distance and site characteristics. This option aids the user for the
investigation of the ‘‘actual’’, on acceptance that this term exists,
frequency content of the recording. It should be noted that
records corresponding to near field recordings are excluded from
979
this primary inspection in order to avoid high frequency content,
due to near-source effects, and nonlinear de-amplification
phenomena. The latter are more prominent in soft sites,
characterized with shear wave velocity less than 360 m/s, at
epicentral distances less than 10 km; which only supports further
the authors’ decision to exclude near field recordings. The selected
recordings are eventually sorted by means of inter-station
distance and the Fourier spectrum of the uncorrected acceleration
of the homonymous components of the three closest stations are
finally provided.
2.2.3. Filter design
The most time consuming procedure when processing strong
motion records involves filter design and implementation.
Concerning the design of a frequency filter, the authors believe
that the user should be free to decide which is the preferable filter
type and its specifications, but within limits. The limits, control-
ling such sensitive a procedure, had been set during the
development tests of Proschema and lead to the conclusion that
infinite impulse response filters of Butterworth and elliptic type
can adequately be used in strong motion record processing.
During the first steps of the present study the theoretical
aspects of filter characteristics played an important role in
selecting which filter types should be incorporated in the
software. The minimum required filter order and the nature of
the transition band of the filter type had been the main criteria for
choosing the filter types used during development tests (Fig. 2).
Elliptic filters are the most efficient in achieving performance
specifications with the minimum filter order (Proakis and
Manolakis, 1996). For a given filter order and performance
specifications elliptic filters exhibit the smallest transition band,
in other words they have the steepest roll off ; a factor that which
can also influence the spectral ordinates.
Butterworth filter type is characterized by a magnitude
response that is maximally flat in the pass band and monotonic
 ARTICLE IN PRESS
980 M. Segou, N. Voulgaris / Computers & Geosciences 36 (2010) 977–986

Fig. 2. Impact of different filter types and implementation techniques on spectral ordinates. Pseudo acceleration response spectra for 5% damping value after four different
types of filtering, all supported by Proschema software. Two filter types, such as Butterworth and elliptic, are combined with two types of filter implementation, such as
causal and phase preserving, in order to illustrate filtering capabilities of this code. All four filtering options have common cut-off frequencies. Usable Data Bandwidth
between 0.0416 and 5.3334 s corresponds to the most strict choice for Butterworth filters; elliptic filters are sharper than other but they show ripples across whole
bandwidth which suggests further caution when designing and implementing the latter.

overall (Ingle and Proakis, 1997) and as a consequence provides a
smoother transition band with low filter order.
Thus, although elliptic filters meet given performance speci-
fications with the lowest order of any filter type, Butterworth
filter is a better choice for several applications since it has better
phase response, whereas the first one is highly non linear near the
desirable data bandwidth (Proakis and Manolakis, 1996).
The concept of parsimony applied in filter design suggests that
Butterworth filter stands as a better choice since a smaller number
of designing factors is required, providing the user with more stable
and replicable results. The definition of the values of pass band
ripple and stop band attenuation are two factors required when
designing an elliptic filter, which can lead to different peak ground
acceleration and Arias intensity values even if the order of the filter
has not been changed (Mollova, 2007). Therefore, selecting Butter-
worth combines the smaller filter order with less steep roll off than
an elliptic filter. The user is free to decide however between these
two filter types when designing a frequency filter.
Except filter type there is a number of filter specifications, such
as the filter order, five pairs of possible low and high cut
frequencies, the nature of the filter’s implementation, that is
whether a causal or phase-preserving implementation is required
and if the time series should be tapered or not, that the user
should enter before the implementation of the filter. Proschema
facilitates the definition of filter’s specifications through a figure
window, in which the Usable Data Bandwidth (UDB) is also stated,
next to the possible pairs of cut off frequencies. The Usable Data
Bandwidth for a strong motion record lies between the high and
low corner frequencies of the selected filter. According to Shakal
et al. (2003) outside this band, filters have removed a great
amount of information making data practically unusable in
modelling structure response.
2.2.4. Filter implementation
In order to create a less severe processing scheme each pair of
the low and high cut off frequencies are combined in a bandpass
filter. Development tests supported the idea that a bandpass
implementation in contrast to a high pass followed by a low pass
filter can produce differences in the time histories. It is our
observation that implementing two filters can influence frequen-
cies more severely than a bandpass filter, which appears to be a
more stable solution.
To implement infinite impulse filtering of an acceleration time
series in the frequency domain, Proschema multiplies the Fourier
transform of the input sequence with the frequency response
function of the filter followed by inverse Fourier Transform
(Scherbaum, 1996).
Acausal implementation in the frequency domain is strongly
suggested since it will prevent phase delay (Scherbaum, 1996) but
causal implementation for specific applications should not be
avoided (Fig. 3). Any recursive filter, such as Butterworth and
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M. Segou, N. Voulgaris / Computers & Geosciences 36 (2010) 977–986
elliptic, can be converted to zero phase with bidirectional
technique of filter implementation (Smith, 1997). Bidirectional
filtering in the frequency domain involves further convolution the
Fourier transform of the data of the first pass with the conjugate
frequency response of the filter and subsequent inverse Fourier
transform.
In the case of the acausal filter implementation special caution
is advised concerning the length of the input sequence so as to
accommodate the filter’s infinite impulse response. Concerning
infinite impulse response filters with acausal implementation,
padding symmetrically the time series with a number of zero
samples is of great importance (Boore, 2005; Boore and Akkar,
2003; Karl, 1989). For a given low cut off frequency the filtered
time series can be severely influenced when no zero padding has
been performed before filtering or even when non adequate
number of zero samples has been added. The number of zero
samples is a function of the low cut off frequency and the order of
the filter (Converse and Brady, 1992; Boore, 2005).
Regarding tapering before padding with zero samples takes
place, in case the length of the original time series is adequate
exceeding 10 seconds, a cosine taper is applied symmetrically to
the 20% of the time series. In any other case the zero padding is
performed before and after the first and last zero-crossing,
respectively.
2.2.5. Selection of the appropriate cut-off frequencies
The stability and easy implementation of spectral division
techniques and frequency domain filtering allows the user to
inspect the velocity and displacement time series once filtering of
the acceleration time series is completed. The selection of the
appropriate pair of cut off frequencies is accomplished through
Fig. 3. Filter implementation techniques. Acceleration time series filtered with causal and phase preserving implementation; notice phase shift. Butterworth filter type and
cut-off frequencies at 0.15 Hz, are common for both implementations. Phase preserving implementation corresponds to a two-pass four-pole filter whereas causal in the
other hand equals a one-pass eight-pole filter implementation.
981
the comparison of acceleration, velocity and displacement filtered
time series which are simultaneously produced after the imple-
mentation of five different band pass filters, which are designed
according to the user defined filters’ specifications at the corres-
ponding window. For clarification reasons the authors state that,
Proschema combines user defined, filter specifications such as
filter type, order, implementation details with each—user defi-
ned—pair of cut off frequencies; designing a unique frequency
response for each of the five filters. The next step involves filtering
the uncorrected acceleration time series with each one of the five
filters and producing velocity and displacement time series after
integration of the each filtered acceleration time series. Together
with the uncorrected acceleration, velocity and displacement time
series the user can inspect five differently filtered acceleration,
velocity and displacement time series and decide which one
corresponds to an adequately filtered time series (see User
Manual for details about corresponding figure windows). After
selecting the most suitable filtered time series the user can review
closely the latter by inspecting the corrected acceleration, velocity
and displacement time series at a dedicated figure (Fig. 4).
2.3. Spectra
2.3.1. Calculation of response spectra
The authors note that in case of a previous phase preserving
implementation, where padding with a number of zero samples
took place, the filtered time series remains padded thought out
the response spectra calculation.
Spectra calculation comes after reviewing the selected filtered
time series which involves inspection of the uncorrected Fourier
 ARTICLE IN PRESS
982 M. Segou, N. Voulgaris / Computers & Geosciences 36 (2010) 977–986
Fig. 4. Inspection of corrected acceleration, velocity and displacement time series with available header and metadata information.
amplitude spectrum versus the filtered spectrum of the
acceleration time series to verify the adequate implementation
of the designed filter.
The calculation of elastic response spectra, in terms of
pseudo-acceleration, velocity and displacement, for the basic
damping levels over a wide range of period estimators (Fig. 5)
follows the numerical method proposed by Nigam and Jennigs
(1969) based on the exact solution of the differential equation
describing ‘‘the maximum response of a simple oscillator
subjected to base-acceleration a(t) ’’.
The authors selected this particular method because there are
observable differences between time and frequency domain
calculations (Robinson et al., 2006) of elastic response spectra.
However small the arithmetic differences are, the smooth nature
of time domain-derived response spectra lead to the final
selection of the well-documented solution provided by Nigam
and Jennigs (1969).
Further response spectra calculation involves the computation
of the measures of the geometric mean, introduced as GMRotD50
and GMRotI50 (Fig. 6), which are independent of the sensor
orientation as defined in Boore et al. (2006). As stated therein
both measures are ‘‘based on a set of geometric means computed
from the as-recorded orthogonal horizontal motions rotated
through all possible non-redundant rotation angles’’. The reader
can refer to the aforementioned paper for the detailed definition
of these two innovative measures since further analysis is beyond
the scope of the present paper.
2.3.2. Calculation of earthquake engineering ground motion
parameters
Concerning engineering parameters Proschema supports the
calculation of various ground motion parameters related with
the duration, the amplitude and the frequency content of the
accelerogram, such as peak ground acceleration and velocity,
effective peak acceleration and velocity, response spectrum
intensity, acceleration spectrum intensity, root-mean squared
acceleration and Arias intensity.
The effective peak acceleration (EPA) is defined as the average
spectral acceleration over the period range 0.1—0.5 s divided
by 2.5, which is the standard amplification factor for a res-
ponse spectrum of 5% damping value. The effective peak
velocity (EPV) is proportional to the average of pseudo-velocity
spectral ordinates at period of about 1 sec divided by a factor
of 2.5. According to the Applied Technology Council (1978)
both parameters could be considered as response spectra
normalization factors and they are further used in Pro-
schema during calculation of normalized response acceleration
spectrum.
The response spectrum intensity (SI), as defined in Housner
(1959) corresponds to the area under the pseudo-velocity
response spectrum between 0.1 and 2.5 s for any fraction of the
critical damping.
Von Thun et al. (1988) introduced the acceleration spectrum
intensity (ASI) defined as the area under the acceleration response
spectrum for 5% value of the critical damping between the 0.1 and
0.5 s period estimators.
Since it is widely used in seismic hazard studies Proschema
includes calculation of cumulative absolute velocity (CAV), which
is the area under the absolute accelerogram (Kramer, 1996).
The remaining engineering parameters include information
about the amplitude and frequency content of the strong motion
record to which root mean squared acceleration and Arias
intensity are closely related. The latter, defined by Arias (1970),
is obtained by integration over the entire duration rather than
over the duration of strong motion (Kramer, 1996).
Even though modern studies proposed a variety of measures
regarding the evaluation of the duration of strong motion; the
authors feel that a widely used measure such as the bracketed
duration will serve Proschema purposes well. The bracketed
duration (Bolt, 1969) is defined as the time between the
first and last exceedances of a threshold acceleration value,
usually 0.05 g (Kramer, 1996). However the authors stress out
that engineering parameters such as root mean squared
acceleration are sensitive to the method used to determine strong
motion duration
 ARTICLE IN PRESS
M. Segou, N. Voulgaris / Computers & Geosciences 36 (2010) 977–986 983

Fig. 5. Inspection of pseudo acceleration response spectra for basic damping values; cut off periods are indicated together with suggested usable data bandwidth, which for
Butterworth phase preserving implementation is considered to be the short and long period cut off multiplied by a factor of 1/0.8 and 0.8, respectively. It is strongly advised
to refrain from using spectral ordinates outside suggested usable data bandwidth, which lies between 0.0416 and 5.3334 s.

Calculating engineering parameters, such as the response
spectrum intensity and acceleration spectrum intensity, by
definition suggests definite integration; but the corresponding
function is not only discontinuous, between the given set of
period estimators, but its arithmetic values under evaluation are
the solution in terms of local maxima of a set of non-linear
equations providing the response of the system only at
discrete values of period estimators; the above remark makes
the mathematical approach towards the area computation a
demanding one.
The current approach supports the use of cubic splines for the
solution of the integral equation of an unknown function (Fig. 7).
The boundary integral method is implemented after the approxi-
mation of the unknown function by means of cubic spline
interpolation along the boundary. Analytically, a vector-valued
spline evaluated at planar points (x(i), y(i), i¼1yn), on this
occasion the (x, y) stands for pairs of (T, PSA or PSV), forms a
spline curve using chord-length parametrization and cubic spline
interpolation.
Cubic spline interpolation is characterized by continuous first
and second derivatives which allows for an accurate definition of
the function under study. The use of cubic splines provides a
better approach than a high order polynomial because the first
lacks abrupt fluctuations.
The definition of the spline curve is followed by the construc-
tion of the indefinite integral and the final evaluation of the
indefinite integral at the endpoints of the basic interval of period
estimators. The difference between the aforementioned integrals
equals the arithmetic value of the definite integral over the basic
interval of interest between period estimators.
The use of cubic splines in addressing problems of mathema-
tical calculations is extended to different fields of earth science
other than engineering seismology, as hydraulics and hydrology
(Liggett and Salmon, 1981).
3. Available Proschema modes
Proschema also includes several operation modes enabling the
user to perform automatic processing, with predefined or varying
processing parameters either for a number of records or for the
remaining components of a multi-component strong motion
record as well as semi-automatic processing through an algorithm
for the selection of the low cut-off corner frequency.
The aforementioned algorithm holds twenty three possible
low cut-off frequencies ranging from 0.08 to 0.3 Hz selecting the
most suitable by testing the stability of the peak ground
displacement value, as derived from the adjacent filtered
displacement time series. That is for every pair of successive
low cut-off’s the difference in peak ground displacement value is
evaluated. At the point where the differences in peak ground
displacement values tend to reach a minimum the strong motion
record is very close to be considered ‘‘noise free’’. The calibration
of the automatic algorithm in terms of the definition of a
subjective threshold, for which the differences in peak ground
displacement values are considered minimized, came through
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984 M. Segou, N. Voulgaris / Computers & Geosciences 36 (2010) 977–986

Fig. 6. Orientation independent ground motion measure GMRotI50, introduced by Boore et al. (2006), compared with standard pseudo acceleration response spectra of
two horizontal components for 5% damping value.

Fig. 7. Cubic spline approximation of response spectra. Computation of earthquake engineering known as acceleration spectrum intensity (ASI) by means of vector valued
splines for achieving approximation of response spectra calculated at an earlier processing stage.

comparing the user selected low cut off frequencies against the that a standard deviation of 0.06 Hz on the selection of the low
suggested from the automatic algorithm using an actual strong cut-off frequency is expected at this time; but Proschema offers
motion data set (Segou et al., 2008) including world wide the user the ability to personalize the default threshold after the
analogue and digital strong motion records. It should be noted latter has processed an adequate number of strong motion
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M. Segou, N. Voulgaris / Computers & Geosciences 36 (2010) 977–986
records. It comes within understanding that the recalculation of
the threshold depicts the user’s behaviour towards strong motion
processing and it is strictly user-dependant.
The user can also perform processing without supervision of a
vast number of strong motion records. Therefore, a standarized
processing structure, that incorporates a number of default
processing parameters such as the filter specifications, informa-
tion about the implementation of baseline or instrument adjust-
ment and re-sampling techniques as well as the calculation of
engineering parameters, is provided; the user however can easily
modify them so as to formulate a processing scheme according to
the research needs.
In case the user wishes to process the remaining component of
a multi-component recording Proschema uses exactly the same
processing parameters as the ones being used during processing
of the current strong motion record.
Proschema also provides the functionality of a scheduled
processing task for files under the specifications of the European
Strong motion Database (Ambraseys et al., 2002), for smc format
files and records converted to mat files through utilities included
in the software. This can be achieved thought a third party
scheduler which initiates Proschema and performs processing
with predefined parameters, as described earlier in this para-
graph.
4. Concluding remarks
Strong motion record processing is a significant component of
earthquake engineering and seismic hazard studies. Even though
several agencies provide corrected acceleration time series, in a
number of cases the researcher should follow a different
processing scheme. The advances of digital signal processing
during the last decades lead the authors to the incorporation this
knowledge related to the processing of earthquake records, in a
computer code that can be used in seismological and engineering
practice. Performing necessary adjustments and implementing
user-designed filters, instead of black box filter implementation,
provides the user the ability to study the effects of processing
techniques and evaluate almost any suggested processing
scheme. Detailed documentation of important aspects regarding
Proschema operation can be found in the Proschema User Manual.
Following current seismological trends Proschema allows the user
to import seismological data collected by broad band velocity
sensors and derive strong motion parameters. Processing of
strong motion records without user supervision can be also a
useful option in order to handle large data sets.
Comments
The user is urged to read the Proschema User Manual for
further documentation, technical references and review of some
theoretical aspects related to the software. An instruction guide
together with useful comments about processing sample data
files included in the software can be found in the last chapter of
the Proschema User Manual. The reader may also communicate
the corresponding author for providing Supplementary codes for
importing strong motion data in other formats.
Acknowledgments
Sample data included in the software have been provided either
by Greek institutions providing strong motion data, such as the
National Observatory of Athens (Kalogeras and Stavrakakis, 2007)
985
and the ITSAK institute for earthquake engineering studies
(Theodulidis et al., 2004) or international data providers, such as
the United States Geological Survey, through the National Strong
Motion Project,1 and the Center for Engineering Strong Motion
Data.2
The first author would like to thank Dr. David Boore for
guidance and comments about strong motion data processing
during the early stage of this research and for providing the
Fortran code for calculating response spectra and orientation
independent measures, the original code can be found in Boore
(2008), the authors give credit in the function reference chapter of
Proschema User Manual as well as at the descriptive header of
transcribed in Matlab codes. Useful comments and suggestions
made by Assistant Professor of the Department of Geophysics-
Geothermics Dr. Tzanis during the first steps of signal processing
proved to be invaluable for the authors. This research had been
funded by the Greek Scholarship Foundation (IKY).
The final version of this paper benefited significantly from the
comments and suggestions made by Dr. Boore and an anonymous
reviewer.
Appendix A. Supplementary material
Supplementary data associated with this article can be found
in the online version at doi:10.1016/j.cageo.2009.09.020.
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