Minimum Safety Factor Evaluation of Slopes Using Hybrid Chaotic Sand Cat and Pattern Search Approach

This study developed an efficient evolutionary hybrid optimization technique based on chaotic sand cat optimization (CSCO) and pattern search (PS) for the evaluation of the minimum safety factor of earth slopes under static and earthquake loading conditions. To improve the sand cat optimization approach’s exploration ability, while also avoiding premature convergence, the chaotic sequence was implemented. The proposed hybrid algorithm (CSCPS) benefits from the effective global search ability of the chaotic sand cat optimization, as well as the powerful local search capability of the pattern search method. The suggested CSCPS algorithm’s efficiency was confirmed by using mathematical test functions, and its findings were compared with standard SCO, as well as some efficient optimization techniques. Then the CSCPS was applied for the calculation of the minimum safety factors of the earth slope exposed to both static and seismic loads, and the objective function was modeled based on the Morgenstern–Price limit equilibrium method, along with the pseudo-static approach. The CSCPS’s efficacy for the evaluation of the minimum safety factor of slopes was investigated by considering two case studies from the literature. The numerical experiments demonstrate that the new algorithm could generate better optimal solutions via calculating lower values of safety factors by up to 10% compared with some other methods in the literature. Furthermore, the results show that, through an increase in the acceleration coefficient to 0.1 and 0.2, the factor of safety decreased by 19% and 32%, respectively.