Survival Probability Determination of Nonlinear Oscillators Subject to Evolutionary Stochastic Excitation

A novel approximate analytical technique for determining the survival probability and first-passage probability density function (PDF) of nonlinear/hysteretic oscillators subject to evolutionary stochastic excitation is developed. Specifically, relying on a stochastic averaging/linearization treatment of the problem, approximate closed form expressions are derived for the oscillator nonstationary marginal, transition, and joint-response amplitude PDFs and, ultimately, for the time-dependent oscillator survival probability. The developed technique exhibits considerable versatility, as it can handle readily cases of oscillators exhibiting complex hysteretic behaviors as well as cases of evolutionary stochastic excitations with time-varying frequency contents. Further, it exhibits notable simplicity since, in essence, it requires only the solution of a first-order nonlinear ordinary differential equation (ODE) for the oscillator nonstationary response variance. Thus, the computational cost involved is kept at a minimum level. The classical hardening Duffing and the versatile Preisach (hysteretic) oscillators are considered in a numerical examples section, in which comparisons with pertinent Monte Carlo simulations data demonstrate the reliability of the proposed technique.