Case Study

Displacement Model for Concrete Dam Safety

Monitoring via Gaussian Process Regression
Considering Extreme Air Temperature
Fei Kang, A.M.ASCE 1; and Junjie Li 2
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Abstract: Structural health monitoring models provide important information for safety control of large dams. The main challenge in
developing an accurate dam behavior prediction model lies in the modeling of extreme temperature effect. This paper presents a Gaussian
process regression-based displacement model for health monitoring of concrete gravity dams, which can model the temperature effect by
using long-term air temperature data. Important attractions of Gaussian processes include accurate simulation results, convenient training, and
so forth. Different covariance functions and temperature variable sets are tested on the horizontal displacement prediction problem of concrete
dams. Results show that segmented air temperature based Gaussian process regression models can reflect the extreme air temperature effect
on displacements of concrete gravity dams, considering the prediction accuracy is much better than that of a mathematical model based on
periodic functions. DOI: 10.1061/(ASCE)ST.1943-541X.0002467. © 2019 American Society of Civil Engineers.
Author keywords: Dam behavior modeling; Displacements; Structural health monitoring; Temperature simulation; Gaussian processes.

Introduction monitoring modeling (Stojanovic et al. 2013; Mata et al. 2014).

According to the statistics of March 2019, there are more than
58,000 dams, which are spread in 96 countries (ICOLD 2019).
China has the largest number of dams and the largest installed hy-
dropower capacity. By 2014, China has completed or is building
6,543 dams over 30 m high, which accounts for 43% of dams with
a height over 30 m in the whole world (Jia 2016). Dam safety sig-
nificantly affects the safety of life, property, and ecological envi-
ronment around the dam. Dam safety monitoring through devices is
a quite important part in dam safety management (Jeon et al. 2009).
The purpose of dam safety monitoring is to identify anomalous
behaviors and take appropriate countermeasures in a timely manner.
(Mata et al. 2013).
The structural behavior of a concrete dam can be reflected by
displacement information (De Sortis and Paoliani 2007; Ardito
et al. 2008; Kang et al. 2009). The observed displacements are com-
pared with prediction values of the mathematical model to judge
whether the dam behavior is still normal. If the divergence exceeds
the predefined warning threshold, the problem has to be studied in
order to prevent a disaster (Mata 2011; Loh et al. 2011). Since the
1950s, various statistical models were adopted for dam behavior
modeling (Li et al. 2013). Multiple linear regression (MLR) and
the improved models have been successfully applied in dam safety
1
Associate Professor, School of Hydraulic Engineering, Faculty of In-
frastructure Engineering, Dalian Univ. of Technology, No. 2 Linggong Rd.,
Dalian 116024, China (corresponding author). Email: kangfei@dlut
.edu.cn; kangfei2009@163.com
2
Professor, School of Hydraulic Engineering, Faculty of Infrastructure
Engineering, Dalian Univ. of Technology, No. 2 Linggong Rd., Dalian
116024, China; Professor, College of Water Conservancy and Hydropower
Engineering, Hohai Univ., Nanjing 210098, China. Email: lijunjie@dlut
.edu.cn
Note. This manuscript was submitted on July 12, 2018; approved on
May 10, 2019; published online on October 23, 2019. Discussion period
open until March 23, 2020; separate discussions must be submitted for
individual papers. This paper is part of the Journal of Structural Engi-
neering, © ASCE, ISSN 0733-9445.
Several studies also emphasized the safety monitoring modeling
problem during the initial operation period of arch dams (Prakash
et al. 2018; Liang et al. 2018) and seepage prediction (Wei et al.
2018). Recently, MLR also has been extended to analyze deforma-
tion data of rock-fill embankment dams (Shi et al. 2018; Gamse and
Oberguggenberger 2017). With the development of machine learn-
ing algorithms, they have been adopted to solve different structural
engineering problems (Wan and Ni 2018; Wan and Ren 2015).
These approaches are generally well-suited to model nonlinear re-
lationships and able to handle nonharmonic periodic covariates
(Nguyen and Goulet 2018). These machine learning techniques in-
clude multilayer perceptrons (Mata 2011; Loh et al. 2011; Kao and
Loh 2013; Stojanovic et al. 2016; Wei et al. 2019), radial basis
function networks (Kang et al. 2019a; Nourani and Babakhani
2013), neuro-fuzzy systems (Ranković et al. 2012; Bui et al. 2018),
support vector machines (Cheng and Zheng 2013; Su et al. 2015;
Ranković et al. 2014; Kang et al. 2019b), boosted regression trees
(Salazar et al. 2017b), extreme learning machines (Kang et al.
2017a), and so on. More extensive reviews for dam behavior mod-
eling were summarized by Salazar et al. (2015, 2017a) and
Bukenya et al. (2014).
Temperature effect part is generally the main component of con-
crete dam displacements (Tatin et al. 2018). Recent studies show
that displacement models using measured temperature can achieve
better results than the hydrostatic seasonal time model (Mata et al.
2014; Kang et al. 2019a). However, when the measured tempera-
ture is adopted, the number of input variables is generally much
increased, and the modeling problem becomes more complex. Re-
cently developed machine learning techniques can be introduced
to establish an accurate model, which can simulate nonlinear rela-
tionships between environmental variables and the response vari-
able. Gaussian process regressions (GPR) (Pérez-Cruz et al. 2013;
Rasmussen and Williams 2006) are the most advanced Bayesian
tools for regression problems. Gaussian processes possess several
attractions compared with other mathematical models. The best
combination of hyperparameters can be determined by solving the
maximum likelihood estimation problem when the covariance

© ASCE 05019001-1 J. Struct. Eng.

J. Struct. Eng., 2020, 146(1): 05019001

 function is selected. Meanwhile, the output of a GPR model has a
clear probabilistic interpretation, which provides a measure of the
prediction uncertainty. GPR has been successfully applied for solv-
ing problems such as pile capacity modeling (Pal and Deswal
2010), signal processing (Hwang and Choi 2012), and slope sta-
bility evaluation (Kang et al. 2015, 2017b). The covariance
function in GPR is generally selected through experience. It was
demonstrated that different covariance functions have unique char-
acteristics (Rasmussen and Nickisch 2010; Snelson 2007; Kang
et al. 2017b). Therefore, the performances of various covariance
functions need to be studied to select the suitable ones for dam
behavior modeling.
The purpose of the paper is to develop a modeling method of
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temperature effect to displacements of concrete gravity dams using
measured air temperature with a GPR tool. Practical approaches
to consider the influence of extreme environmental temperature to
concrete dam displacement are proposed. Nonlinear mapping ca-
pability of GPR models with various covariance functions is studied
to make an appropriate selection. The proposed approach is verified
on a real-world concrete gravity dam.
Hydrostatic-Season-Time Model
Displacement (or deformation) is an overall index of the dam health
status and it is also the most intuitive reflection of dam behaviors.
Therefore, the displacement monitoring modeling problem is stud-
ied. As shown in Fig. 1, the concrete dam displacement is affected
by several environmental variables. The displacement data obtained
by an instrument can be formulated by a general statistical model as
δ ¼ yh þ yT þ y t þ ε
where δ is the measured displacement, yh is the component caused
by hydrostatic load, yT is the component caused by temperature
changes, yt is the time effects and variable ε represents the residual
error.
The hydrostatic-season-time model (HST) (Ahmadi-Nedushan
2002; Léger and Leclerc 2007) is the most commonly adopted
model for displacement modeling of concrete dams. In the HST
model, a polynomial function is usually adopted to describe the
hydrostatic pressure effect according to mechanical analysis as
y h ¼ a0 þ a1 h1 þ a2 h2 þ a3 h3 ; or
y h ¼ a0 þ a1 h þ a2 h þ a3 h þ a4 h4
1 2 3
where h represents the reservoir water depth and ai ði ¼ 0; : : : ; 4)
are the coefficients. For an arch dam, the fourth-order polynomial
Dam static responses
Environmental variables
Prediction models
Water level Displacement
Temperature Uplift pressure
Rain fall Leakage
Time effect
Dam
Strain
Foundation
Fig. 1. Modeling for dam safety monitoring.
© ASCE
J. Struct. Eng., 2020, 146(1): 05019001
function could be used. While for a concrete gravity dam, the cubic
polynomial function is recommended (Wu 2003).
For a concrete dam that has been in operation for many years,
the temperature changes that caused displacement are generally
assumed to evolve periodically. The temperature effect can be
described by periodic functions as (Léger and Leclerc 2007;
Mata 2011)
yT ¼ b0 þ b1 sinðsÞ þ b2 cosðsÞ þ b3 sin2 ðsÞ þ b4 sinðsÞ cosðsÞ
ð3Þ
where s ¼ 2πk=365.25, k represents the number of days from
observation date to January 1 of the year, and bj (j ¼ 0; : : : ; 4)
are coefficients to be determined.
The time effect in Eq. (1) is mainly caused by creep. The asymp-
totic variation of time effect can be described as (Léger and Leclerc
2007; Mata et al. 2013) or Eq. (5) (Gu and Wu 2006; Su et al. 2015;
Li et al. 2013)
yt ¼ c0 þ c1 θ þ c2 e−θ ð4Þ
yt ¼ c0 þ c1 θ þ c2 lnðθ þ 1Þ ð5Þ
where θ ¼ t=100 (Gu and Wu 2006) or θ ¼ t=365 (Salazar et al.
2015), t represents the number of days from analysis beginning
date, c0 , c1 , and c2 are coefficients. Exponential functions or log-
arithmic functions are generally adopted to represent the evolution
of concrete creep at early days. A linear function yt ¼ c0 þ c1 θ is
recommended to dams running for many years (Tatin et al. 2015).
ð1Þ GPR-Based Displacement Model Considering
Extreme Temperature
Gaussian Process Regression
From the perspective of machine learning, dam health monitoring
modeling is a regression problem. A Gaussian process (Rasmussen
and Williams 2006; Rasmussen and Nickisch 2010; Kang et al.
2015) is a powerful tool for dealing with high dimensional regres-
sion problems. The advantage of GPR is the ability to learn smooth-
ness parameters and the noise to provide uncertainty estimation
from training data. Given a data set S ¼ fX; yg, where X ¼
½x1 ; : : : ; xn  represents the matrix composed by the input vectors,
ð2Þ y ¼ ½y1 ; : : : ; yn  represents the output. xi is a vector and yi is a
variable. The relationship between the input and the output can be
given as
yi ¼ fðxi Þ þ εn ð6Þ
where fðxÞ is the underlying regression function, and εn is the noise
term drawn from Nð0; σ2n Þ.
Furthermore, f ¼ ½fðx1 Þ; : : : ; fðxn ÞT is assumed to behave ac-
cording to a Gaussian process pðf jXÞ ¼ Nð0; KÞ, where K repre-
sents the covariance matrix. The element of K is K ij ¼ kðxi ; xj Þ,
which represents the covariance between fðxi Þ and fðxj Þ values.
GPR is aimed to calculate the prediction distribution of f  at
points X ¼ ½x1 ; : : : ; xm . An isotropic Gaussian can be adopted
to describe the distribution of y conditioned on f as
pðyjf ; XÞ ¼ Nð f ; σ2n IÞ ð7Þ
where I represents the identity matrix.
The marginal distribution of y can be obtained considering prop-
erties of Gaussian distribution as
05019001-2 J. Struct. Eng.
 Z
(4) RQard function
pðyjXÞ ¼ pðyjf ; XÞpðf jXÞdf ¼ Nð0; K þ σ2n IÞ ð8Þ
 −α
1
kðxp ; xq Þ ¼ σ2f 1þ ðx − xq ÞT Mðxp − xq Þ ð17Þ
Under the prior, the joint distribution of y and f  is given as 2α p
     where θ ¼ ðln l1 ; : : : ; ln lD ; ln σf ; ln αÞ.
y KðX; XÞ þ σ2n I KðX; X Þ
∼ N 0; ð9Þ (5) Materniso function
f KðX ; XÞ KðX ; X Þ
kðxp ; xq Þ ¼ σ2f fd ðrd Þ expð−rd Þ;
Then, the predictive distribution of f  can be deived as qffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
rd ¼ ðd=l2 Þðxp − xq ÞT ðxp − xq Þ ð18Þ
pðf  jX; y; X Þ ∼ Nðf̄  ; covðf  ÞÞ ð10Þ
where d ¼ 1, 3, 5, and f1 ðtÞ ¼ 1, f3 ðtÞ ¼ 1 þ t, f 5 ðtÞ ¼
f̄  ¼ KðX ; XÞ½KðX; XÞ þ σ2n I−1 y ð11Þ f 3 ðtÞ þ t2 =3, θ ¼ ðln l; ln σf Þ.
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(6) PPiso function

covðf  Þ ¼ KðX ; X Þ − KðX ; XÞ½KðX; XÞ þ σ2n I−1 KðX; X Þ kðxp ; xq Þ ¼ σ2f maxð0; 1 − rÞ · fv ðr; jÞ ð19Þ
ð12Þ
where fðxÞ ¼ ðxp − xq ÞT ðxp − xq Þ=l2 , j ¼ bD=2c þ v þ 1,
where f̄  represents the predicted function value and covðf  Þ v ¼ 0; : : : ; 3, f v ðr; jÞ represents piecewise polynomial func-
represents the variance. tions, and θ ¼ ðln l; ln σf Þ.
The hyperparameters of GPR models can be achieved by maxi- (7) Periodic function
mizing the log-likelihood, which is expressed as follows:
kðxp ; xq Þ ¼ σ2f expð−2sin2 ðπðxp − xq Þ=ωÞ=l2 Þ ð20Þ
1 1 n
log pðyjX; θÞ ¼ − yT ðK þ σ2n IÞ−1 y − log jK þ σ2n Ij − log 2π where θ ¼ ðln l; ln ω; ln σf Þ.
2 2 2
ð13Þ (8) LINard function
kðxp ; xq Þ ¼ xTp Mxq ð21Þ
The maximization problem is generally solved by an optimiza-
tion algorithm such as the conjugate gradients method. where θ ¼ ðln l1 ; : : : ; ln lD Þ.
(9) LINone function
Covariance Functions kðxp ; xq Þ ¼ ðxTp xq þ 1Þ=l2 ð22Þ
From Eq. (11), it is found that prediction results of GPR are affected
by the covariance function. Therefore, the choice of covariance where θ ¼ ln l.
function is quite important for successful GPR modeling. For input
pairs xp and xq , some well-known covariance functions are de- (10) Poly function
scribed as follows (Rasmussen and Nickisch 2010; Kang et al.
kðxp ; xq Þ ¼ σ2f ðxTp · xq þ cÞd ð23Þ
2017b). For the convenience of description, the hyperparameters
to be learned are denoted as a vector θ. where d is the predefined degree, and θ ¼ ðln c; ln σf Þ.
(1) SEiso function
  (11) NNone function
2 1
kðxp ; xq Þ ¼ σf exp − 2 ðxp − xq Þ ðxp − xq Þ
T
  qffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
2l
  kðxp ; xq Þ ¼ σ2f sin−1 xTp l−2 xq fðxp Þfðxq Þ ð24Þ
1 X D
¼ σ2f exp − 2 ðxp;i − xq;i Þ2 ð14Þ
2l i¼1 where fðxÞ ¼ 1 þ xT x=l2 , θ ¼ ðln l; ln σf Þ.

where θ ¼ ðln l; ln σf Þ. (12) Noise function

(2) SEard function
  kðxp ; xq Þ ¼ σ2n δðp; qÞ ð25Þ
1
kðxp ; xq Þ ¼ σ2f exp − ðxp − xq ÞT Mðxp − xq Þ where σ2n represents the noise variance, δðp; qÞ equals 1 if
2
! p ¼ q, and 0 otherwise. The function is generally added to
2 1X D
ðxp;i − xq;i Þ2 other covariance functions to take zero mean Gaussian noise
¼ σf exp − ð15Þ
2 i¼1 l2i into account.

where l ¼ ½l1 ; l2 ; : : : lD T , M ¼ diagðlÞ−2 , and θ¼

Variable Sets for Considering Extreme Temperature
ðln l1 ; : : : ; ln lD ; ln σf Þ.
(3) RQiso function The temperature effect is due to temperature changes of the dam
 −α and rock foundation. When there are enough temperature records
2 1 obtained by thermometers installed inside the dam-foundation sys-
kðxp ; xq Þ ¼ σf 1 þ ðxp − xq Þ ðxp − xq Þ
T
ð16Þ
2αl2 tem, temperature changes that caused displacement can be de-
scribed as functions of internal temperature data (Mata et al. 2014;
where θ ¼ ðln l; ln σf ; ln αÞ, and α is the index. Su et al. 2015; Li et al. 2015). There is generally not enough

© ASCE 05019001-3 J. Struct. Eng.

J. Struct. Eng., 2020, 146(1): 05019001

 40
30
Air temperature ( C)
Air temperature ( C)
20
10
0 0
-10
-20
-30
2000 2001 2002 2003
(a) Time (year)
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Fig. 2. Temperature variations in different years: (a) winter; and (b) summer.
recorded dam temperature for a concrete dam that has been run for
many years.
It is convenient to simulate the temperature effect by using har-
monic sinusoidal functions as described in the HST model. How-
ever, the effect of extreme low or extreme high temperatures on the
dam displacement cannot be reflected by this type of periodic func-
tion. The internal temperature changes are mainly influenced by
environmental temperature changes. Except for simulation by har-
monic functions, the temperature effect can also be described by air
temperature. Considering there is a lag effect existing between the
internal and outside temperature changes (He et al. 2010; Shi et al.
2018), the displacement caused by temperature changes can be
simulated as
yT ¼ b1 T 0 þ b2 T 1−2 þ b3 T 3−7 þ b4 T 8−15
þ b5 T 16−30 þ b6 T 31−60 þ · · · ð26Þ
where T p−q is the mean value of air temperature during the p
to q days before the displacement measurement date (Kang et al.
2019b).
Mata et al. (2014) proposed a model using internal tempera-
tures and better performance is obtained and compared with a HST
model. Considering the internal temperature is correlated to the out-
side temperature, it is promising to obtain reliable results using air
temperature for yT modeling. In the literature, no more than one-
third year temperature data is adopted, and the proper length of time
still needs further discussion. Fig. 2 shows an example of temper-
ature variations around a reservoir. There is a difference of 10°C
between the temperatures of different years. More reasonable sim-
ulation is expected by using long-period air temperature data. There-
fore, the following variable sets are proposed (Kang et al. 2019a)
S1 ¼ fT 0 ; T 1−2 ; T 3−7 ; T 8−15 ; T 16−30 ; T 31−60 ; T 61−90 ; T 91−120 g
ð27Þ
S2 ¼ fT 0 ; T 1−2 ; T 3−7 ; T 8−15 ; T 16−30 ; T 31−60 ;
T 61−90 ; T 91−120 ; T 121−180 g ð28Þ
S3 ¼ fT 0 ; T 1−2 ; T 3−7 ; T 8−15 ; T 16−30 ; T 31−60 ; T 61−90 ; T 91−120 ;
T 121−180 ; T 181−240 ; T 241−300 ; T 301−365 g ð29Þ
S4 ¼ fT 0 ; T 1−2 ; T 3−7 ; T 8−15 ; T 16−30 ; T 31−60 ; T 61−90 ; T 91−120 ;
T 121−180 ; T 181−240 ; T 241−300 ; T 301−365 ; T 366−430 ; T 431−490 ;
T 491−550 ; T 551−610 ; T 611−670 ; T 671−730 g ð30Þ
© ASCE 05019001-4
J. Struct. Eng., 2020, 146(1): 05019001
40
30
20
10
-10
-20
-30
2005 2006 2007 2008
(b) Time (year)
S5 ¼ fT 0 ; T 1−2 ; T 3−7 ; T 8−15 ; T 16−30 ; T 31−60 ; T 61−90 ; T 91−120 ;
T 121−180 ; T 181−240 ; T 241−300 ; T 301−365 ; T 366−430 ; T 431−490 ;
T 491−550 ; T 551−610 ; T 611−670 ; T 671−730 ; T 731−790 ; T 791−850 ;
T 851−910 ; T 911−970 ; T 971−1030 ; T 1031−1095 g ð31Þ
Eqs. (27)–(31), S1 , and S2 contain data of one-third year and
half a year before the displacement observation date. S3 , S4 , and S5
contain data of one to three years before the displacement meas-
urement, respectively. Variable sets using additional years’ data can
be obtained in this manner. The proposed variable sets are adopted
together with other variables for displacement modeling (Kang et al.
2019b). For example, when S4 is adopted, the complete variable set
can be summarized as {H1 , H 2 , H3 , T 0 , T 1−2 , T 3−7 , T 8−15 , T 16−30 ,
T 31−60 , T 61−90 , T 91−120 , T 121−180 , T 181−240 , T 241−300 , T 301−365 ,
T 366−430 , T 431−490 , T 491−550 , T 551−610 , T 611−670 , T 671−730 , θ}.
Dam Health Monitoring Modeling Using GPR
Considering Extreme Temperatures
A MLR model is unable to simulate dam responses accurately
when segmented air temperature data are adopted. Therefore, a
flexible GPR model is preferable to be adopted to model nonlinear
interactions between many input variables. According to Eq. (11),
the model based on GPR for displacement modeling of concrete
dams can be expressed as
yD ¼ GPRðxÞ ¼ Kðx; XÞ½KðX; XÞ þ σ2 I−1 y ð32Þ
For displacement modeling, different input variables should be
taken into account when different temperature effect simulation ap-
proaches are adopted (Kang et al. 2019b). When periodic functions
are adopted, the input can be given as
x ¼ fH1 ; H 2 ; H 3 ; sinðsÞ; cosðsÞ; sin2 ðsÞ; sinðsÞ cosðsÞ; θg ð33Þ
When the proposed approach is adopted, using simulation with
S4 as an example, the input can be given as
x ¼ fH1 ; H 2 ; H3 ; T 0 ; T 1−2 ; T 3−7 ; T 8−15 ; T 16−30 ; T 31−60 ; T 61−90 ;
T 91−120 ; T 121−180 ; T 181−240 ; T 241−300 ; T 301−365 ; T 366−430 ;
T 431−490 ; T 491−550 ; T 551−610 ; T 611−670 ; T 671−730 ; θg ð34Þ
The GPR model is established based on data selected from the
dam safety monitoring system. Several performance criterions are
adopted to evaluate different models. These criterions include the
root mean squared error (RMSE), the mean absolute error (AEmean ),
J. Struct. Eng.
 the maximum absolute error (AEmax ), and the correlation coeffi- 5. Initialize the hyperparameters of GPR and select a proper
cient (R) are shown as follows (Kang et al. 2017a, 2019a) covariance function.
6. Train the GPR model by optimizing the hyperparameters with a
AEmean ¼ maxðyD ðiÞ − yðiÞÞ; i ¼ 1; : : : ; N ð35Þ conjugate gradients method.
7. Establish the prediction equations for horizontal displacements
with the obtained hyperparameters.
1X N
AEmean ¼ jy ðiÞ − yðiÞj ð36Þ 8. Test the generalization performance of the established model
N i¼1 D using test samples.
9. Apply the established GPR model for displacement prediction
vffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
u N of concrete gravity dams.
u1 X
RMSE ¼ t ðy ðiÞ − yðiÞÞ2 ð37Þ
N i¼1 D
Case Study
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PN
ðyD ðiÞ − ȳD ÞðyðiÞ − ȳÞ
R ¼ pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
PN i¼1 2
PN
i¼1 ðy D ðiÞ − ȳD Þ i¼1 ðyðiÞ − ȳÞ
where yD and ȳD are the prediction values and the average value, y
and ȳ are the measured values and the average value, and N is the
number of observations. The desired model should have the mini-
mum RMSE, AEmax , AEmean and an R close to 1. The RMSE,
AEmax , and AEmean have the same unit mm as the displacement of
the concrete gravity dam.
The main steps of the proposed approach are summarized as
follows. The flowchart is shown in Fig. 3.
1. Select the input vector x. The output variable y is the horizontal
displacement.
2. When the air temperature variables are selected, the values of
these segmented variables can be calculated based on measured
air temperature series.
3. Select data from the dam safety monitoring system, and estab-
lish sample sets for the GPR model training and test. Divide the
selected data into the training and test sets. Training samples
account for about 80%, and test samples account for about 20%
of the total samples. If there is enough data, more test samples
can be adopted.
4. Normalize the original data into [0, 1].
Start
Prepare training samples and test samples
The proposed methodology was verified on a real-world concrete
2
ð38Þ gravity dam. The performance was also compared with that of
conventional MLR models and harmonic sinusoidal function-
based GPR models. All the modeling problems were performed in
MATLAB (version R2014a) environment.
The open-source package Gaussian Packages for Machine
Learning (GPML) (Rasmussen and Nickisch 2010) was employed
to perform the analyses of GPR. The hyperparameters were initial-
ized before running the GPR model (Rasmussen and Williams
2006). Except for special statements, the parameters were initialized
as ln σf ¼ 0, ln σn ¼ 0.1, ln α ¼ 0, ln c ¼ 0, ln ω ¼ 2, and ln li ¼ 0
according to the experience (Kang et al. 2015, 2017b).
Concrete Gravity Dam Description and
Data Preparation
The example shown in Fig. 4 is a 91-m high and 1,080-m long
concrete gravity dam. The whole dam is divided into 60 sections
with the same width along the axis. The dam construction was com-
pleted in 1953. A safety monitoring system was also installed to
know the dam status. The measured items include reservoir water
levels, air temperatures, displacements, seepages, and so on. At the
beginning, horizontal displacements at the top of the dam are
measured by using tension wire alignment, which is replaced by
a vacuum laser collimation system with higher accuracy in 1984.
Using Section 32 of the dam as an example, the effectiveness of
the proposed displacement model is studied. Data from Section 32
are sufficient for displacement modeling. The water level curve is

using segmented air temperature

Normalize the data into the range [0 1]

Set the initial hyperparamters of GPR

Train the GPR model using training data

Test the model performance using test data

No
Accuracy Satisfied?

Yes
Structural health monitoring of dams

Fig. 3. Flowchart of proposed approach for dam health monitoring Fig. 4. Downstream view of concrete gravity dam. (Image by
modeling. Fei Kang.)

© ASCE 05019001-5 J. Struct. Eng.

J. Struct. Eng., 2020, 146(1): 05019001

 265
260

Water level (m)

255
250
Training Test
245
240
235
1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009
Time (year)

Fig. 5. Measured water level of reservoir.

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4
Training Test
2
Displacement (mm)

0
-2
-4
-6
-8
-10
-12
1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009
Time (year)

Fig. 6. Horizontal displacement at crest of Section 32 of the dam.

40
30
Air temperature ( C)

20
10
0
-10
-20
-30
1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009
Time (year)

Fig. 7. Measured mean daily air temperature.

shown in Fig. 5. The horizontal displacement curve of Section 32 is
illustrated in Fig. 6. The measured mean daily air temperature curve
is shown in Fig. 7. Data are selected from 1997 to 2008, and a total
of 156 samples are formed. The training set contains 127 samples
within the period 1997–2006, and the test set contains 29 samples
in 2007–2008.
Before the experiments, outlier detection was performed. The
standardized residual (ei =σ) is adopted to judge whether the obser-
vation is an outlier, where ei is the residual of data i, σ is the stan-
dard deviation. The points outside the boundary of 3 are regarded
as outliers since the probability of standardized residuals within the
range of ½−3; þ3 is 99.7%. The results are shown in Fig. 8, and one
sample is identified as the outlier. The SEard covariance function
is adopted in Fig. 8, because it performs the best for the studied
problem. In the following sections “Experimental Studies of GPR
Models Using Harmonic Functions” and “Experimental Studies of
GPR Models Using Air Temperature,” the outlier is removed. In the
section “Effect of Outliers to Prediction Accuracy,” the outlier is
kept as it is to observe the influence.
Experimental Studies of GPR Models Using
Harmonic Functions
First, the proposed GPR model for dam displacement prediction is
compared with multiple linear regression and stepwise regression
using harmonic sinusoidal functions. The adopted environmental
variables (input variables) are listed in Table 1, according to section
“GPR-Based Displacement Model Considering Extreme Tempera-
ture.” Initial values and optimization results for hyperparameters of
GPR models with representative covariance functions are given in
Table 2. Three components of dam horizontal displacement are an-
alyzed by statistical analysis and presented in Fig. 9. The temper-
ature effect takes the most important part in the dam horizontal
displacement variations.
The comparison of prediction values by MLR using periodic
functions (MLR-HST) and measured values are illustrated in
Fig. 10. Convergence process curves for optimizing hyperpara-
meters of GPR using harmonic functions are illustrated in Fig. 11.
The adopted optimization algorithm can efficiently find the optimal
parameters. The performance of GPR using periodic functions

© ASCE 05019001-6 J. Struct. Eng.

J. Struct. Eng., 2020, 146(1): 05019001

 5 5
4 4

Standardized residual 3 3

Standardized residual
2 2
1 1

0 0

-1 -1
-2 -2

-3 -3

-4 -4
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-5 -5
1996 1998 2000 2002 2004 2006 2008 1996 1998 2000 2002 2004 2006 2008
(a) Time (year) (b) Time (year)

Fig. 8. Outlier detection results: (a) MLR-HST model; and (b) GPR-S4 using SEard covariance function.

Table 1. Variables adopted in different forecasting models when harmonic 8

functions are applied Displacement of hydrostatic effect
6 Displacement of temperature effect
GRP GRP GPR GPR
Displacement of time effect
Variable MLR SR (SEiso)-1 (SEiso)-2 (SEard)-1 (SEard)-2
H1 4
Displacement (mm)
S — S — S —
H2 S — S — S —
H3 S S S S S S 2
sinðdÞ S S S S S S
cosðdÞ S S S S S S 0
sin2 ðdÞ S S S S S S
sinðdÞ cosðdÞ S S S S S S -2
θ S S S S S S
Note: S means the variable is selected as one of the factors and blank means -4
the variable is unselected.
-6
1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007
Time (year)
(GPR-HST) is shown in Fig. 12. As can be seen in Figs. 10 and 12,
the GPR model fits better than the MLR model on the test case. Fig. 9. Three components of dam horizontal displacement analyzed by
The prediction errors and correlation coefficients of different MLR model using harmonic sinusoidal functions.
models are listed in Table 3. The best results are highlighted in
boldface. The GPR model performs better than MLR and SR. The
tests AEmax , AEmean , and RMSE of the GPR-HST model are
1.1657, 0.4871, and 0.5858, which are obviously smaller than the NNone, and Poly also can obtain relatively good results, which have
values 1.4208, 0.6164, and 0.7256 obtained by the MLR-HST the test AEmean below 0.51 and the test RMSE below 0.61.
model. Difference in RMSE for the test set between MLR-HST
and GPR-HST is 19.3%, whereas the training accuracy is much
better for the GPR model. This is mainly because the test samples Experimental Studies of GPR Models Using Air
Temperature
are not involved in the model establishment process. The possibility
of overfitting is discussed in the following section. The adopted air temperature variable sets are given in Table 5. In
The influence of covariance functions to the performance of the literature (He 2010), up to one-third of a year’s air temperature
GPR is shown in Table 4. The SEard function performs the best, and data was adopted to simulate the studied dam response. In this
the best results are highlighted in boldface. The functions RQard, study, air temperature variable sets of long periods are also tested.

Table 2. Initial values and optimization results for hyperparameters of GPR

Models Initial values for fθ; ln σn g Optimized values for fθ; ln σn g
GRP (SEiso)-1 f0; 0; lnð0.1Þg f0.856; −0.312; −3.735g
GRP (SEiso)-2 f0; 0; lnð0.1Þg f0.694; −0.237; −3.740g
GPR (SEard)-1 f0; 0; 0; 0; 0; 0; 0; 0; 0; lnð0.1Þg f3.092; 2.643; 0.247; 0.498; 0.783; 2.529; 4.269; 1.066; −0.143; −3.734g
GRP (SEiso)-2 f0; 0; 0; 0; 0; 0; 0; lnð0.1Þg f0.232; 0.480; 0.767; 2.540; 4.541; 1.051; −0.163; −3.733g
Matérn (d ¼ 5) f0; 0; lnð0.1Þg f1.519; 0.0671; −3.766g

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J. Struct. Eng., 2020, 146(1): 05019001

 4 4
Predicted value Predicted value
2 Measured value 2 Measured value

0 0

Displacement (mm)
Displacement (mm)

-2 -2

-4 -4

-6 -6

-8 -8

-10 -10
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-12 -12
1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2007 2008 2009
(a) Time (year) (b) Time (year)

Fig. 10. Performance of harmonic functions based MLR model: (a) training; and (b) test.

-60 The results of multiple linear regression models using these vari-
GRP (SEiso) - 1 able sets are given in Table 6. However, air temperature based MLR
-80
GRP (SEiso) - 2 models do not perform as well as the MLR-HST models in terms of
Negative marginal likelihood

-100 GPR (SEard) - 1 the prediction errors. The reason is that MLR models are not able to
GPR (SEard) - 2 simulate the nonlinear relationship between many air temperature
-120 variables and the studied dam response.
-140 Prediction results of GPR models using air temperature variable
sets are given in Table 7. The best results are highlighted in bold-
-160 face. As provided in Table 7, with the increase of temperature data
-180
adopted, the prediction errors become smaller and smaller. But
when the period of temperature data increased from two years to
-200 three years, the prediction errors are not reducing any more. That
means two years’ air temperature data is enough to the studied
-220
problem. The prediction results of GPR are much better than that
-240 of MLR when air temperature data are adopted for modeling. Con-
0 20 40 60 80 100 vergence process curves for optimizing hyperparameters of GPR
Number of function evaluations using two years’ air temperature (GPR-S4 ) are illustrated in Fig. 13.
The adopted optimization algorithm converges quickly even as the
Fig. 11. Convergence process curves for optimizing hyperparameters
of GPR using harmonic functions by setting initial parameters as
dimension of input variables is much increased. The performance
fθ; ln σn g ¼ f0; : : : ; 0; lnð0.1Þg.
of GPR-S4 model is also shown in Fig. 14. The GPR model fits
better than the MLR-HST model.

4 4
Predicted value
Predicted value
2 2 Measured value
Measured value

0 0
Displacement (mm)
Displacement (mm)

-2 -2

-4 -4

-6 -6

-8 -8

-10 -10

-12 -12
1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2007 2008 2009
(a) Time (year) (b) Time (year)

Fig. 12. Performance of harmonic functions based GPR (SEard)-1 model: (a) training; and (b) test.

© ASCE 05019001-8 J. Struct. Eng.

J. Struct. Eng., 2020, 146(1): 05019001

 Table 3. Accuracy of dam health monitoring models using harmonic functions
Training Test
Algorithm AEmax AEmean RMSE R AEmax AEmean RMSE R
MLR 1.7896 0.4960 0.6145 0.9800 1.4208 0.6164 0.7256 0.9857
SR 1.7496 0.4965 0.6157 0.9799 1.3867 0.6141 0.7228 0.9860
GRP (SEiso)-1 0.5528 0.1555 0.1973 0.9980 1.2696 0.5418 0.6538 0.9895
GRP (SEiso)-2 0.5090 0.1532 0.1946 0.9980 1.3151 0.6067 0.7176 0.9887
GPR (SEard)-1 0.5667 0.1604 0.2044 0.9978 1.1657 0.4871 0.5858 0.9897
GRP (SEard)-2 0.5670 0.1603 0.2043 0.9978 1.1671 0.4879 0.5871 0.9897
Note: The best results are highlighted in boldface. The unit of AEmax , AEmean , and RMSE is mm.
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Table 4. Displacement prediction errors of GPR models when harmonic functions are adopted for temperature effect simulation
Training Testing
Covariance functions AEmax AEmean RMSE R AEmax AEmean RMSE R
SEiso 0.5528 0.1555 0.1973 0.9980 1.2696 0.5418 0.6538 0.9895
SEard 0.5667 0.1604 0.2044 0.9978 1.1657 0.4871 0.5858 0.9897
RQiso 0.5444 0.1518 0.1935 0.9981 1.3034 0.5777 0.6857 0.9893
RQard 0.5676 0.1604 0.2043 0.9978 1.1742 0.4913 0.5904 0.9897
Matérn (d ¼ 1) 0.0000 0.0000 0.0000 1.0000 1.7103 0.6224 0.7665 0.9853
Matérn (d ¼ 3) 0.4661 0.1292 0.1668 0.9986 1.3744 0.5770 0.6835 0.9881
Matérn (d ¼ 5) 0.5231 0.1453 0.1864 0.9982 1.3089 0.5749 0.6794 0.9889
PPiso (v ¼ 0) 0.0000 0.0000 0.0000 1.0000 1.7099 0.6221 0.7662 0.9853
PPiso (v ¼ 1) 0.4671 0.1295 0.1671 0.9985 1.3693 0.5744 0.6805 0.9881
PPiso (v ¼ 2) 0.5288 0.1470 0.1883 0.9982 1.2955 0.5647 0.6697 0.9891
PPiso (v ¼ 3) 0.5453 0.1522 0.1939 0.9980 1.2817 0.5539 0.6623 0.9894
Periodic 0.5496 0.1546 0.1963 0.9980 1.2921 0.5703 0.6812 0.9894
LINard 1.9706 0.5181 0.6738 0.9783 3.0911 1.2200 1.5365 0.9126
LINone 0.8766 0.2487 0.3080 0.9951 1.3896 0.6200 0.7278 0.9858
Poly (d ¼ 1) 0.8729 0.2490 0.3082 0.9951 1.3811 0.6193 0.7270 0.9859
Poly (d ¼ 2) 0.5781 0.1642 0.2071 0.9978 1.1882 0.4965 0.6062 0.9900
Poly (d ¼ 3) 0.5712 0.1585 0.2019 0.9979 1.1784 0.5049 0.6084 0.9896
Poly (d ¼ 4) 0.5719 0.1577 0.2013 0.9979 1.1819 0.5052 0.6074 0.9896
Poly (d ¼ 11) 0.5693 0.1563 0.2000 0.9979 1.1929 0.5089 0.6091 0.9894
Poly (d ¼ 12) 0.5744 0.1573 0.2011 0.9979 1.1834 0.5035 0.6044 0.9896
NNone 0.5621 0.1598 0.2020 0.9979 1.1923 0.4847 0.5910 0.9901
Note: For Poly (d ¼ 12), the hyperparameters were initialized as fθ; ln σn g ¼ f−1; −1; lnð0.1Þg. The best results are highlighted in boldface. The unit of
AEmax , AEmean , and RMSE is mm.

Table 5. Temperature effect simulation variable sets

Temperature variable sets
HST (Léger and Leclerc 2007)
S01 (He 2010)
S02 (Su et al. 2005)
S03 (Xi et al. 2011)
S04 (Shi et al. 2018)
S05 (Kang et al. 2017a)
S06 (Bui et al. 2018)
S1 (data for 1/3 year)
S2 (data for 1/2 year)
S3 (data for 1 year)
S4 (data for 2 years)
S5 (data for 3 years)
Temperature variables
fsinðsÞ; cosðsÞ; sin2 ðsÞ; sinðsÞ cosðsÞg
fT 0 ; T 1−7 ; T 8−30 ; T 31−60 ; T 61−120 g
fT 0 ; T 1−3 ; T 4−7 ; T 8−15 ; T 16−30 ; T 31−60 g
fT 0 ; T 1−7 ; T 8−15 ; T 16−30 ; T 31−60 ; T 61−90 g
fT 0−1 ; T 1−2 ; T 3−7 ; T 8−15 ; T 16−30 g
fT 0 ; T 1−7 ; T 8−15 ; T 16−30 ; T 31−60 g
fT 0 ; T 1−15 ; T 16−30 ; T 31−60 g
fT 0 ; T 1−2 ; T 3−7 ; T 8−15 ; T 16−30 ; T 31−60 ; T 61−90 ; T 91−120 g
fT 0 ; T 1−2 ; T 3−7 ; T 8−15 ; T 16−30 ; T 31−60 ; T 61−90 ; T 91−120 ; T 121−180 g
fT 0 ; T 1−2 ; T 3−7 ; T 8−15 ; T 16−30 ; T 31−60 ; T 61−90 ; T 91−120 ; T 121−180 ; T 181−240 ; T 241−300 ; T 301−365 g
fT 0 ; T 1−2 ; T 3−7 ; T 8−15 ; T 16−30 ; T 31−60 ; T 61−90 ; T 91−120 ; T 121−180 ; T 181−240 ; T 241−300 ; T 301−365 ; T 366−430 ; T 431−490 ; T 491−550 ;
T 551−610 ; T 611−670 ; T 671−730 g
fT 0 ; T 1−2 ; T 3−7 ; T 8−15 ; T 16−30 ; T 31−60 ; T 61−90 ; T 91−120 ; T 121−180 ; T 181−240 ; T 241−300 ; T 301−365 ; T 366−430 ; T 431−490 ; T 491−550 ;
T 551−610 ; T 611−670 ; T 671−730 ; T 731−790 ; T 791−850 ; T 851−910 ; T 911−970 ; T 971−1030 ; T 1031−1095 g

Performances of different covariance functions are also studied
when air temperature is adopted. Initial values and optimization
results for hyperparameters of GPR models with typical covariance
functions are given in Table 8. Performances of various covariance
functions are listed in Table 9. The best results are highlighted in
boldface and are obtained by the SEard covariance function. The
tests AEmax , AEmean , and RMSE of air temperature based GPR
models are 0.8924, 0.2947, and 0.3726, which are much smaller
than the values 1.1657, 0.4871, and 0.5858 obtained by the GPR
model utilizing harmonic sinusoidal functions.

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 Table 6. Performance of MLR models using different air temperature variable sets
Training Test
Air temperature
variable sets AEmax AEmean RMSE R AEmax AEmean RMSE R
S01 3.0638 0.8817 1.0898 0.9356 2.6172 1.0937 1.2963 0.9468
S02 3.5886 0.8857 1.0880 0.9358 2.7231 1.1103 1.3197 0.9459
S03 3.2811 0.8720 1.0698 0.9380 2.8289 1.0997 1.3211 0.9427
S1 (data for 1/3 year) 3.2488 0.8758 1.0680 0.9382 2.8105 1.1023 1.3164 0.9426
S2 (data for 1/2 year) 2.7715 0.7926 0.9695 0.9494 2.9410 1.0300 1.2414 0.9476
S3 (data for 1 year) 2.2118 0.5680 0.7014 0.9738 1.5038 0.8150 0.9232 0.9843
S4 (data for 2 years) 1.5697 0.4736 0.5956 0.9812 1.8696 0.7704 0.8994 0.9891
S5 (data for 3 years) 1.7099 0.4023 0.5010 0.9867 2.0359 0.8292 0.9907 0.9720
Note: The unit of AEmax , AEmean , and RMSE is mm.
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Table 7. Performance of GPR (SEard) models using different air temperature variable sets
Training Test
Air temperature
variable sets AEmax AEmean RMSE R AEmax AEmean RMSE R
S01 0.6817 0.1196 0.1603 0.9987 1.3119 0.6262 0.7348 0.9918
S02 0.7146 0.1254 0.1649 0.9986 1.3375 0.6461 0.7531 0.9928
S03 0.6496 0.1171 0.1553 0.9987 1.2650 0.6472 0.7499 0.9926
S1 (data for 1/3 year) 0.6677 0.1141 0.1532 0.9988 1.3908 0.5620 0.6850 0.9910
S2 (data for 1/2 year) 0.5098 0.0924 0.1217 0.9992 1.1568 0.4099 0.5239 0.9922
S3 (data for 1 year) 0.4988 0.0912 0.1209 0.9992 1.0656 0.4299 0.5204 0.9929
S4 (data for 2 years) 0.2153 0.0611 0.0774 0.9997 0.8924 0.2947 0.3726 0.9951
S5 (data for 3 years) 0.1448 0.0443 0.0557 0.9998 0.9966 0.3359 0.4359 0.9932
Note: The best results are highlighted in boldface. The unit of AEmax , AEmean , and RMSE is mm.

0 at the beginning of the section “Case Study” generally will not

GPR (SEiso) cause overfitting problems.
-40 GPR (RQiso) Prediction residuals and performance criterion values of differ-
ent models are shown in Figs. 15 and 16. The performance im-
Negative marginal likelihood

GPR (SEard)
-80 GPR (RQard) provement rates of the proposed approach to other models are
given in Table 11. The GPR-HST model performs much better than
-120 MLR-HST model. The GPR-S4 model performs the best since the
obtained residuals and prediction errors are much smaller than that
-160 of GPR-HST and MLR-HST models.

-200 Effect of Outliers to Prediction Accuracy

-240
-280
0 20 40 60
Number of function evaluations
Fig. 13. Convergence process curves for optimizing hyperparameters
of GPR using two years’ air temperature by setting initial parameters as
fθ; ln σn g ¼ f0; : : : ; 0; lnð0.1Þg.
In Table 9, the RMSE in the test period is nearly five times that
obtained for training. The test error is much larger than the training
error mainly because the test samples are not involved in the model
establishment. The GPR (SEard) model performance can be af-
fected by the initial hyperparameters. To test if there was an over-
fitting problem, different initial parameters were tested. The results
are given in Table 10. The best results are highlighted in boldface.
Most of the parameter sets can obtain a similar test accuracy. In the
last two rows, it seems the model is overfitting with unsuitable ini-
tialization. The initialization method for hyperparameters described
In the section “Concrete Gravity Dam Description and Data Prepa-
ration,” one sample is identified as outlier. To see the robustness of
different models to outliers, different models are established using
80 100 data with the outlier. The simulation results of different models us-
ing data with and without the outlier are listed in Table 12, and the
performance of the GPR–S4 model using data with the outlier is
shown in Figs. 17 and 18. The best result in Table 12 is highlighted
in boldface. The prediction accuracy comparisons among different
models are given in Table 13.
The difference between different versions of models is small.
Although certain data are identified as outliers, they may contain
some important information about the dam conditions. But a gen-
eral conclusion cannot be drawn from the analysis carried out, as
only one outlier with a small deviation was detected. In practice, the
models established using data with and without outliers can be
compared to see whether the outliers should be deleted from the
original data set.
Conclusion
In this paper, a long-term air temperature based GPR model is pre-
sented for displacement prediction of concrete gravity dams. First,

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 4 4
Predicted value Predicted value
2 Measured value 2 Measured value

0 0

Displacement (mm)
Displacement (mm)

-2 -2

-4 -4

-6 -6

-8 -8

-10 -10
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-12 -12
1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2007 2008 2009
(a) Time (year) (b) Time (year)

Fig. 14. Performance of GPR model using two’ years air temperature: (a) training; and (b) test.

Table 8. Initial values and optimization results for hyperparameters of GPR using two years’ air temperature
Models Initial values for fθ; ln σn g Optimized values
GRP (SEiso) fln l; ln σf ; ln σn g ¼ f0; 0; lnð0.1Þg f0.532; −1.085; −4.240g
GRP (RQiso) fln l; ln σf ; ln α; ln σn g ¼ f0; 0; 0; lnð0.1Þg f1.026; −0.631; −0.717; −4.299g
GPR (SEard) fln l1 ; : : : ; ln l22 ; ln σf ; ln σn g ¼ f−1; : : : ; −1; 0; lnð0.1Þg f3.920; 3.770; −0.660; 1.756; 0.287; 0.652; 5.846; 1.033; −0.427;
5.617; 6.192; −0.392; 2.676; 0.103; 4.703; 3.181; 2.935; −0.544;
0.029; 0.428; 1.847; 0.502; −1.454; −4.374g
GRP (RQard) fln l1 ; : : : ; ln l22 ; ln σf ; ln α; ln σn g ¼ f0; : : : ; 0; 0; 0; lnð0.1Þg f2.301; 1.911; −0.370; 2.422; 0.629; 1.049; 1.776; 3.440; −0.025;
3.439; 2.504; −0.071; 0.195; 0.533; 3.316; 1.159; 0.940; −0.234;
0.741; 3.300; 2.809; 0.545; −1.170; 0.805; −4.416g
Matérn (d ¼ 5) fln l; ln σf ; ln σn g ¼ f0; 0; lnð0.1Þg f1.117; −0.797; −4.290g
Note: For the SEard function, the parameters are initialized as fln l1 ; : : : ; ln l22 ; ln σf ; ln σn g ¼ ½−1; : : : ; −1; 0; lnð0.1Þ.

Table 9. Displacement prediction performances of GPR models when S4 is adopted for temperature effect simulation
Training Testing
Covariance
functions AEmax AEmean RMSE R AEmax AEmean RMSE R
SEiso 0.3043 0.0688 0.0887 0.9996 1.1218 0.3810 0.4876 0.9947
SEard 0.2153 0.0611 0.0774 0.9997 0.8924 0.2947 0.3726 0.9951
RQiso 0.2628 0.0617 0.0802 0.9997 1.1069 0.4217 0.5159 0.9939
RQard 0.2462 0.0584 0.0753 0.9997 1.1049 0.3480 0.4416 0.9949
Matérn (d ¼ 1) 0.0000 0.0000 0.0000 1.0000 1.2602 0.5234 0.6323 0.9926
Matérn (d ¼ 3) 0.2269 0.0502 0.0645 0.9998 1.1068 0.4251 0.5263 0.9936
Matérn (d ¼ 5) 0.2536 0.0618 0.0799 0.9997 1.0737 0.4112 0.5059 0.9941
PPiso (v ¼ 0) 0.0000 0.0000 0.0000 1.0000 1.2600 0.5233 0.6322 0.9926
PPiso (v ¼ 1) 0.2287 0.0506 0.0651 0.9998 1.1031 0.4235 0.5244 0.9936
PPiso (v ¼ 2) 0.2586 0.0627 0.0810 0.9997 1.0757 0.4054 0.5006 0.9943
PPiso (v ¼ 3) 0.2790 0.0644 0.0836 0.9996 1.0928 0.3961 0.4937 0.9945
Periodic 0.2758 0.0624 0.0802 0.9997 1.1444 0.4195 0.5179 0.9938
LINard 0.7883 0.2553 0.3191 0.9947 1.9032 0.7923 0.9385 0.9877
LINone 0.7843 0.2436 0.3073 0.9951 1.9415 0.7812 0.9276 0.9882
Poly (d ¼ 1) 0.7703 0.2410 0.3041 0.9952 1.9558 0.7811 0.9280 0.9893
Poly (d ¼ 2) 0.4162 0.1198 0.1519 0.9988 1.1328 0.4317 0.5194 0.9937
Poly (d ¼ 3) 0.4211 0.0993 0.1289 0.9991 1.2080 0.4263 0.5265 0.9936
Poly (d ¼ 4) 0.4051 0.0964 0.1249 0.9992 1.2018 0.4237 0.5242 0.9935
Poly (d ¼ 5) 0.3978 0.0960 0.1241 0.9992 1.1970 0.4214 0.5221 0.9935
Poly (d ¼ 11) 0.2545 0.0553 0.0736 0.9997 1.0328 0.3994 0.5049 0.9921
Poly (d ¼ 12) 0.3872 0.0969 0.1248 0.9992 1.1882 0.4165 0.5176 0.9936
NNone 0.2709 0.0657 0.0855 0.9996 1.1548 0.4142 0.5254 0.9952
Note: For the SEard function, the initial parameters are set as (ln l1 ; : : : ; ln l22 ; ln σf ; ln σn Þ ¼ ½−1; : : : ; −1; 0; lnð0.1Þ. For Poly (d ¼ 12), the initial
parameters are set as ðln c; ln σf ; ln σn Þ ¼ ½−1; 0; lnð0.1Þ. The best results are highlighted in boldface. The unit of AEmax , AEmean , and RMSE is mm.

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 Table 10. Influence of initial hyperparameters to the performance of GPR (SEard)-S4 model
Training Test
Hyperparameters
fln l1 ; : : : ; ln l22 ; ln σf ; ln σn g AEmax AEmean RMSE R AEmax AEmean RMSE R
f0; : : : ; 0; 0; lnð0.1Þg 0.2406 0.0622 0.0798 0.9997 0.9539 0.3159 0.4115 0.9950
f0; : : : ; 0; 0; lnð1.0Þg 0.2372 0.0615 0.0790 0.9997 0.9895 0.3191 0.4158 0.9950
f0; : : : ; 0; 0; lnð10.0Þg 0.2406 0.0630 0.0808 0.9997 0.9587 0.3164 0.4131 0.9951
f0; : : : ; 0; −1; lnð0.1Þg 0.2424 0.0630 0.0806 0.9997 0.9632 0.3194 0.4157 0.9951
f−1; : : : ; −1; 0; lnð0.1Þg 0.2153 0.0611 0.0774 0.9997 0.8924 0.2947 0.3726 0.9951
f−1; : : : ; −1; −1; lnð0.1Þg 0.2224 0.0596 0.0763 0.9997 1.1281 0.3288 0.4277 0.9950
f−1; : : : ; −1; 0; lnð10.0Þg 0.2277 0.0595 0.0767 0.9997 1.0490 0.3167 0.4128 0.9950
f−1; : : : ; −1; −1; lnð10.0Þg 0.2336 0.0603 0.0777 0.9997 1.0348 0.3185 0.4149 0.9950
f1; : : : ; 1; 1; lnð1.0Þg 0.2355 0.0619 0.0794 0.9997 0.9941 0.3174 0.4149 0.9950
f10; : : : ; 10; 10; lnð10.0Þg 0.4057 0.1312 0.1618 0.9986 0.9607 0.3282 0.4090 0.9936
f10; : : : ; 10; 0; lnð0.1Þg
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3.3833 1.2938 1.5434 1.0000 5.2233 2.8330 3.1074 0.0000

f−2; : : : ; −2; 0; lnð0.1Þg 0.0001 0.0000 0.0000 1.0000 2.5849 0.5483 0.7515 0.9801
f−2; : : : ; −2; −1; lnð0.1Þg 0.0012 0.0003 0.0003 1.0000 1.8206 0.7712 0.9405 0.9648
Note: The best results are highlighted in boldface. The unit of AEmax , AEmean , and RMSE is mm.

2 1.5
MLR - HST MLR - HST
1.5 GPR - HST GPR - HST
1 GPR - S4
GPR - S4
1
0.5
Residual (mm)
Residual (mm)

0.5
0
0
-0.5
-0.5

-1 -1

-1.5 -1.5
1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2007 2008 2009
(a) Time (year) (b) Time (year)

Fig. 15. Prediction residuals of different models: (a) training; and (b) test.

2.0 2.0
1.790 MLR - HST MLR - HST
GPR - HST GPR - HST
1.6 GPR - S4 1.6 GPR - S4
Value of prediction error

Value of prediction error

1.421

1.2 1.2 1.166

0.892
0.8 0.8 0.726
0.615 0.616 0.586
0.567
0.496 0.487
0.4 0.4 0.373
0.295
0.215 0.204
0.160
0.061 0.077
0.0 0.0
AE max AE mean RMSE AE max AE mean RMSE

(a) (b)

Fig. 16. Performance comparison of different models using data without outlier: (a) on training data; and (b) on test data.

GPR is introduced to establish the displacement model for safety verified on displacement monitoring data of a real case. Mean-
monitoring of concrete gravity dams. Then, long-period air tem- while, the influence of covariance function to GPR performance
perature based variable sets are adopted to simulate the thermal ef- is also studied. The findings through the research are summarized
fect of displacement more accurately. The proposed approach is as follows:

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 Table 11. Prediction accuracy comparison among three models
Performance Performance Performance
improvement rate improvement rate improvement rate
Prediction of GPR-HST to of GPR-S4 to of GPR-S4 to
accuracy MLR-HST GPR-HST GPR-S4 MLR-HST (%) GPR-HST (%) MLR-HST (%)
Training AEmax 1.7896 0.5667 0.2153 68.33 62.01 87.97
Training AEmean 0.496 0.1604 0.0611 67.66 61.91 87.68
Training RMSE 0.6145 0.2044 0.0774 66.74 62.13 87.40
Test AEmax 1.4208 1.1657 0.8924 17.95 23.45 37.19
Test AEmean 0.6164 0.4871 0.2947 20.98 39.50 52.19
Test RMSE 0.7256 0.5858 0.3726 19.27 36.39 48.65
Note: The unit of AEmax , AEmean , and RMSE is mm.
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Table 12. Effect of outliers

Training Test
Cases AEmax AEmean RMSE R AEmax AEmean RMSE R
MLR-HST with outliers 2.6680 0.5164 0.6593 0.9768 1.4353 0.6345 0.7374 0.9847
MLR-HST no outlier 1.7896 0.4960 0.6145 0.9800 1.4208 0.6164 0.7256 0.9857
GPR-HST with outliers 0.9477 0.1676 0.2219 0.9974 1.1838 0.4494 0.5419 0.9893
GPR-HST no outlier 0.5667 0.1604 0.2044 0.9978 1.1657 0.4871 0.5858 0.9897
GPR-S4 with outliers 0.3158 0.0757 0.0976 0.9995 0.8490 0.2984 0.3806 0.9949
GPR-S4 no outlier 0.2153 0.0611 0.0774 0.9997 0.8924 0.2947 0.3726 0.9951
Note: The unit of AEmax , AEmean , and RMSE is mm.

4 4
Predicted value Predicted value
2 Measured value 2 Measured value

0 0
Displacement (mm)
Displacement (mm)

-2 -2

-4 -4

-6 -6

-8 -8

-10 -10

-12 -12
1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2007 2008 2009
(a) Time (year) (b) Time (year)

Fig. 17. Performance of GPR–S4 model using data with outlier: (a) training; and (b) test.

1. GPR is the state-of-the-art tool for nonlinear regression pro-
blems. The introduction of GPR can make dam behavior mod-
eling more effective and convenient. It is demonstrated that GPR
models can capture nonlinear relationships between environmen-
tal variables and the horizontal displacement at the top of the
concrete dam.
2. Different from the HST model, long-term air temperature is
adopted in the proposed approach to make more precise displa-
cement predictions of concrete gravity dams. The air tempera-
ture can be obtained from the meteorological station near the
dam. More accurate prediction results than that of the HST mod-
el can be obtained without more sensors.
3. Although the GPR-S4 model using two years’ data performs the
best for the studied dam, for another concrete dam, the best fit
models may adopt air temperate data of one year, three years,
four years, and so on, considering the dam heights, dam shapes,
water depths, and so forth, are noticeably changed for different
dams.
4. Simulation results show that the GPR model using squared
exponential covariance function obtains the best results. For a
preliminary trial, covariance functions SEard and RQard are re-
commended. Other covariance functions, such as polynomial
covariance function, Matérn class of covariance functions, neur-
al network covariance function, and so on, can also be tested to
obtain the most applicable one for the studied problem.
5. Compared with GPR-HST, the proposed approach improves
the tests AEmax , AEmean , and RMSE by 23.45%, 39.50%, and
36.39%, respectively. Compared with MLR-HST, the proposed
approach improves the tests AEmax , AEmean , and RMSE by
37.19%, 52.19%, and 48.65%, respectively. The study focuses

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 0.4 0.8
GPR model without outlier GPR model without outlier
GPR model with outlier 0.6 GPR model with outlier
0.3
0.4
0.2
0.2
Residual (mm)

Residual (mm)
0.1 0

0 -0.2

-0.4
-0.1
-0.6
-0.2
-0.8
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-0.3 -1
1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2007 2008 2009
(a) Time (year) (b) Time (year)

Fig. 18. Effect of outlier to prediction residuals of GPR–S4 model: (a) training; and (b) test.

Table 13. Prediction accuracy comparison among three models using data with one outlier
Performance Performance Performance
improvement of improvement improvement
Prediction GPR-HST to of GPR-S4 to of GPR-S4 to
accuracy MLR-HST GPR-HST GPR-S4 MLR-HST (%) GPR-HST (%) MLR-HST (%)
Training AEmax 2.668 0.9477 0.3158 64.48 66.68 88.16
Training AEmean 0.5164 0.1676 0.0757 67.54 54.83 85.34
Training RMSE 0.6593 0.2219 0.0976 66.34 56.02 85.20
Test AEmax 1.4353 1.1838 0.849 17.52 28.28 40.85
Test AEmean 0.6345 0.4494 0.2984 29.17 33.60 52.97
Test RMSE 0.7374 0.5419 0.3806 26.51 29.77 48.39
Note: The unit of AEmax , AEmean , and RMSE is mm.

on the horizontal displacement modeling of a concrete gravity
dam. The applicability of the proposed method on modeling
other device measurements related to the behavior of the dam
needs further verification.
6. The horizontal displacement is measured by a vacuum laser
collimation system. According to the technical specification for
concrete dam safety monitoring (Wang et al. 2013), the accuracy
of displacements measured by the vertical line, the extension
line, and the vacuum laser alignment system can reach from 0.1
to 0.3 mm. The proposed approach improves the test AEmax
from 1.4208–0.8924 mm, and the RMSE from 0.7256 to
0.3726 mm. Therefore, the improvement is meaningful consid-
ering the resolution of the measuring device.
7. The proposed model is tested on horizontal displacement mod-
eling of a concrete gravity dam. The test set has 29 samples that
are almost evenly distributed over two years. Therefore, the test
sample has a certain representativeness. In the future, the pro-
posed approach will require further verification and research for
the cases of more test samples, modeling problems of other mon-
itoring variables and other types of dams.
Acknowledgments
The research is supported by the National Key R & D Program of
China (2016YFC0401600 and 2017YFC0404900), the National
Natural Science Foundation of China (51769033 and 51779035),
the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities
(DUT17ZD205 and DUT19LK14), and the Open Research Fund of
the State Key Laboratory of Structural Analysis for Industrial Equip-
ment (GZ15207). The open-source toolbox GPML is employed to
perform the analyses of GPR.
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