For offshore platforms installed in seismically active regions, maintaining the safety of operations is an important concern. Therefore, the reliability of these structures, under earthquake ground motions, should be evaluated accurately. In this study, reliability methods are applied to determine the probability of failure of jacket platforms against extreme level earthquake (ELE), considering uncertainties in ground motions and the properties of the structure and soil. They are verified by two variance reduction Monte Carlo sampling methods to find the most efficient method in terms of both accuracy and calculation time. During the ELE event, also called strength level earthquake, structural members and foundation components are permitted to sustain localised and limited nonlinear behaviour, so a force-based criterion is utilized for the limit-state function. The results indicate that all reliability methods, except for FOSM, provide a good approximation of the probability of failure. Also, Point-fitting SORM is the most efficient method.

The European earwig F. auricularia L. is an omnivore that has only recently been identified as a direct, fruit-feeding pest of citrus. Here, we start to build the basic tools needed for integrated pest management for this species. We introduce a time-efficient sampling method based on small wooden boards placed on the ground, and we use them in a 2-yr survey of 93 commercial citrus blocks in California's San Joaquin Valley. Insecticides were not applied targeting F. auricularia in any of these citrus blocks. We find that F. auricularia populations are very low or undetectable in most blocks, with higher densities occurring only sporadically. To know when control measures should be implemented, we used video-monitoring of citrus tree trunks to characterize the timing of F. auricularia movement from their soil nests into the tree canopy. Movement of earwigs along the tree trunks was observed throughout our sampling period (22 March to 18 June), suggesting that control measures (sticky bands placed on trunks, or insecticides applied to trunks and surrounding soil surface) should be applied early, well before petal fall when fruit are susceptible to F. auricularia herbivory. Sticky barriers effectively reduced the vertical movement of 2 crawling arthropods, F. auricularia and the Fuller rose beetle Napactus godmanni, along citrus trunks. We failed to find any relationship between estimated F. auricularia densities and damage to maturing or harvested fruit. This highlights a set of important and still unresolved questions about the biology of this species, underscoring the need for additional research.

Aiming at the problem that it is difficult to collect the subsurface lunar water ice samples quickly due to the cementation-hardening of ice and soil at extremely low temperature in the permanent shadow regions, a novel lunar water ice sampling system is proposed, which uses kinetic energy penetration to efficiently expose the subsurface lunar water ice and uses manipulator to accurately collect and transfer the lunar soil samples. Based on the analysis of the working strategy of the sampling system, an engineering prototype of penetrating modular was designed and developed, and its penetration efficiency was tested based on the principle that the mechanical characteristics are equivalent. The test results show that the penetrating modular can penetrate into the target whose uniaxial compressive strength(UCS) is about 30Mpa (equivalent to the UCS of the simulated lunar water ice) with low power consumption and high efficiency, the penetration depth can reach 234mm, and the penetration time is less than 1s.