Construction and Building Materials 409 (2023) 133911

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Construction and Building Materials

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

Hybrid random forest-based models for predicting shear strength of

structural surfaces based on surface morphology parameters and
metaheuristic algorithms
Jian Zhou a, *, Peixi Yang a, Chuanqi Li b, Kun Du a, *
a
School of Resources and Safety Engineering, Central South University, Changsha 410083, China
b
Laboratory 3SR, CNRS UMR 5521, Grenoble Alpes University, Grenoble 38000, France

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: The prediction of shear strength between soil-structure interactions is of great significance to the stability of
Peak interface efficiency geotechnical engineering. In this study, 480 morphological data with seven morphological parameters (deviation
Morphological parameters of the root mean square value of the profile (Pq), skewness of the height distribution in the profile (Psk), kurtosis
Dragonfly algorithm
of the height distribution of the profiles (Pku), average width of outline elements (PSm), root mean square slope
Sparrow Search Algorithm
Whale optimization algorithm
of the profile (Pdq), material ratio of the profile(Pmr), number of peaks (Ppc)) were selected to generate a
comprehensive database for predicting the peak interface efficiency (IEp) considering three different soil particle
sizes (0.35 mm, 0.53 mm, and 0.80 mm). Three random forest (RF) models optimized using dragonfly algorithm
(DA-RF), sparrow search algorithm optimized random forest (SSA-RF), and whale optimization algorithm (WOA-
RF) were generated to predict IEp. and compared the predictive performance with extreme learning machine
(ELM), support vector regression with radial basis function kernel (SVR-RBF) and initial RF models. The mean
absolute error (MAE), the mean absolute percentage error (MAPE), the root mean square error (RMSE), and the
coefficient of determination (R2) were used to evaluate the performance of all models. The results showed that
the WOA-RF model has achieved the best performance by resulting in MAE of (0.0145, 0.0181, 0.0179 and
0.0210, 0.0273, 0.0216), MAPE of (1.9866, 2.6417, 2.5310 and 2.8924, 4.0294, 3.0816), and RMSE of (0 0178,
0.0237,0.0224 and 0.0252, 0.0362, 0.0276), R2 (0.9473, 0.9262, 0.9352 and 0.9404, 0.8433, 0.9313) in the
training and testing phases. The results of significance analysis indicated that Pdq and Pq have more importance
than other parameters for predicting IEp.

1. Introduction
Geotechnical engineering has always faced the challenge of under­
standing the interaction between soil and structure, which must be
addressed from a practical perspective. One of the main areas of concern
is that the interactions induced by contact interfaces between two
different objects. Unstable system at the interface can lead to relative
displacement of the contact points leading to structural instability
[2,13,22,75,90,91,100,109]. For instance, weak structural surfaces
affect the slope stability [69] and the joint surfaces is closely related to
the fragmentation of rock mass [12]. In particular, the shear strength of
structural surfaces plays an important role in maintaining the structure
stability [14].
The mechanical characteristics of the interaction between soil-
structures result from various factors, like particle properties [19,20]
and soil density [50,52,112] are significant parameters affecting soil-
structure interface behavior. In addition to the intrinsic properties of
the soil, the morphological characteristics of soil surface also exert a
notable influence on the shear strength. Therefore, a comprehensive
consideration of various morphological factors is required to enhance
the accuracy of evaluating the mechanical properties at the soil-
structure interface. Several parameters including the geometry and
material type of the structure surface, dryness and humidity, particle
size, water content, and surface roughness on the mechanical properties
of the soil-structure interface have been examined to assess shear
strength of structural surfaces [9,23,43,68,80,82,89]. Among these
morphological characteristics, the interface roughness has an important
impact on the shear strength at the soil contact point and subsequent

* Corresponding authors.
E-mail addresses: csujzhou@hotmail.com, j.zhou@csu.edu.cn (J. Zhou), dukuncsu@csu.edu.cn (K. Du).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.conbuildmat.2023.133911
Received 7 August 2023; Received in revised form 19 October 2023; Accepted 20 October 2023
0950-0618/© 2023 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
J. Zhou et al.
Fig. 1. Schematic flow chart of DA.
deformation [4,20,28,66,79,82,102]. However, it is not sufficient to
classify interface roughness into smooth and rough based on qualitative
analysis to clarify the potency of interface roughness in the interaction
between soil-structures. Uesugi et al. [73] proposed the relative
roughness as a classic quantitative index to describe surface morphology
(Rn = Rmax /D50 , where Rmax represents the maximum height of the
surface, and D50 represents the average particle diameter). This study
provides a detailed classification of D50 to investigate the shear strength
of structural surfaces. However, the traditional approach of conducting
numerous experiments to measure morphological characteristics and
study the relationship between them and the shear strength of structural
surfaces is time-consuming and labor-intensive. Thus, there is a need to
develop more efficient methods to understand the complexity of the soil-
structure interface.
AI technologies, such as machine learning (ML), have become
increasingly popular in structural and geotechnical engineering due to
their exceptional merit and powerful learning abilities [31,35,61,67]. In
recent years, several studies have demonstrated the effectiveness of ML
models in predicting various mechanical properties of interfaces, such as
the effect of surface roughness, relative soil density and normal stiffness
on interfacial behavior [97]; the interface shear behavior between
frozen soil and structure surface [15], the behavior of underground
structures in soils and rocks [33], influence of soil-structure interactions
on seismic response of building systems [47,81]. Furthermore, some
scholars combined ML algorithms with simulation experiments to
replace the capture of underlying physics or system processes by the
simulation model with the autonomous learning of ML algorithms,
improving accuracy while greatly reducing the time originally required
for simulation [3,72,76,80,88]. Numerous ML models were utilized to
solve diverse geological problems, such as the extreme learning machine
(ELM) [37,38,62], a support vector regression with radial basis function
kernel (SVR-RBF) [8,39,53], adaptive boosting (AdaBoost) [24],
gradient boosting regression tree (GBRT) [25,116], artificial neural
networks (ANN) [36], least square support vector machine (LSSVM)
[60,94], genetic programing (GP) [65], extreme Gradient Boosting
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Construction and Building Materials 409 (2023) 133911
(XGBoost) algorithm [84,114,115], backpropagation neural network
(BPNN) [113]. While the above ML models are more or less restricted by
some limitations which affect their predictive performance. For
instance, ELM has shown success in some applications, it is prone to
overfitting and stochasticity issues when dealing with practical prob­
lems [21,29]. In contrast, SVR has limitations in its applicability and
effectiveness in handling nonlinear and non-monotonic relationships,
and requires extensive data preprocessing for optimal performance [55].
Nevertheless, random forest (RF) regression is widely applied because of
its strong robustness, inclusiveness and powerful ability to avoid over­
fitting [1,17,40,42,96,97,99,101,110]. In RF model, selecting the
appropriate combination of hyperparameters is essential for enhancing
the generalizability of the model, mitigating the risk of overfitting, and
ultimately improving the accuracy of predictions [7]. Grid search,
random search and metaheuristic algorithms are typical optimization
methods. However, grid search has limitations being prohibitively slow,
and random search is restricted by the distribution of space. These ap­
proaches are primarily suitable for smaller search spaces and models. As
engineering problems become increasingly intricate, the size of the
search space and model volume continue to expand. Thus, traditional
search methods are inadequate to meet the demand for efficient and
effective problem-solving [41]. Metaheuristic algorithms-based swarm
intelligence are favored for their demonstrated efficiency in dealing with
high-dimensional and complex problems. [11]. Moayedi et al. [51]
utilized the dragonfly optimization (DA) algorithm and the whale
optimization algorithm (WOA) to optimize the artificial neural network
(ANN) model for predicting the soil shear strength (SSS). As a result, the
DA-ANN and WOA-ANN hybrid models achieved higher R2 values of
0.7647 and 0.7442 than that of the traditional ANN model (0.6329).
Yang et al. [86] utilized the sparrow search algorithm (SSA) to optimize
the gradient boosted regression tree (GBRT) model for predicting the
penetration rate (PR) of tunnel boring machines (TBM). The evaluation
results indicated that the performance of optimized GBRF is superior
than the initial GBRT model by means of the higher R and RMSE values
(0.871 and 0.120).
J. Zhou et al.
Fig. 2. Schematic flow chart of SSA.
Therefore, this paper aims to combine DA, SSA and WOA algorithms
and RF model for predicting the shear strength of soil-structure inter­
face. The rest of this paper is listed as follows: In Section 2, the funda­
mental RF model with DA, SSA and WOA are reviewed. In Section 3,
surface morphological parameters of the structural interface are pre­
processed and several evaluation indices are introduced to determine
model performance. In Section 4, three hybrid RF models (DA-RF, SSA-
RF, and WOA-RF) are developed and compared to the unoptimized RF,
ELM, and SVR-RBF models. The significance analysis is adopted to
calculate parameter importance. The main conclusions and limitations
of this paper are discussed in Section 5.
2. Materials and method
2.1. Random forest
The Random Forest (RF) was proposed by Breiman [7], combining of
“Bootstrap aggregating” method and “Random subspace” method
[6,27]. The instructions for using RF model are as follows: First, the
Bootstrap method is used to generate a random number of training sets,
i.e., resample. Then, a series of decision trees corresponding to these
training sets are generated, and each non-leaf node is split with a
random selection of attributes to complete the tree growth. Next, all
decision trees need to be verified using the testing set. Finally, the
average value of all predicted values obtained by all decision trees is
considered as the final prediction result.
2.2. Dragonfly algorithm
DA is a class of bionic algorithms proposed by Mirjalili et al. [48],
which is centered on simulating the behavior of individual and clusters
of dragonflies in nature to perform optimization search. Dragonfly
habits consist of the following five behaviors: separating, lining up,
aligning, feeding, and avoiding natural predators. The aim of separating
behavior is to prevent collisions between individual dragonfly; align­
ment is matching of speed between individuals when flying with each
other; and alliance behavior describes a moving together in dragonfly
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Construction and Building Materials 409 (2023) 133911
group. The resulting schematic flow diagram of the DA algorithm is
shown in Fig. 1.
In DA, two important dragonfly behaviors of searching for prey and
the hiding from natural enemies can be expressed by the Eq. (1):
{
Fm = X + − X
(1)
Em = X − − X
where Fm represents the position vector of the m-th dragonfly in
searching prey, X represents the current position of the individual
dragonfly, and X+ represents the position of the prey; Em denotes the
direction vector of the dragonfly to avoid the natural enemy and X-
denotes the position vector of the natural enemy.
Since the dragonfly is in constant motion most of the time, the dy­
namic position of the dragonfly (Xt+1 ) and the corresponding step vector
ΔXt+1 can be expressed by the following equation:
{
Xt+1 = Xt + ΔXt+1
(2)
ΔXt+1 = (sSm + aAm + cCm + f Fm + eEm ) + ωΔXt
where s, a, c, f, and e represent the weights of the five behaviors,
respectively. while Sm , Am , Cm ,Fm , and Em represent the position vectors
of the five behaviors, respectively. And ω is the inertia weight.
If the proximity solution is not searched in the vicinity of similar
individuals, the space is going to be searched by means of Levy flight,
then the position update method is changed as follows:
Xt+1 = Xm + Levy(d)ΔXm (3)
where d denotes dimensionality, and Levy denotes the levy flight
expression [44].
2.3. Sparrow search algorithm
Xue and Shen [85] proposed a novel metaheuristic algorithm by
observing the predatory and anti-predatory behavior of sparrows, called
the sparrow search algorithm. The SSA is a metaheuristic optimization
algorithm inspired by the social behavior of sparrows as shown in Fig. 2.
The algorithm involves a search process in which sparrows move around
J. Zhou et al.
Fig. 3. Schematic flow chart of WOA.
in search of food, and the best sparrow becomes the leader of the group.
In the optimization process, solutions are represented by sparrows, and
their positions are updated based on the leader’s position and the best
solution found so far. The algorithm aims to converge to the optimal
solution by gradually improving the solutions of the sparrow population.
The discoverers usually have a larger foraging search space than the
producers, and the position of the discoverer in the searching space can
be expressed by the following equation:
⎧
⎪ i
⎨ Xi,j ⋅exp(− ), if R2 < ST
Xi,jt+1 = α.itermax (4)
⎪
⎩ X + Q.L, if R ⩾ST
i,j 2 D = |CX * (n) − X(n)|
where t represents the current number of iterations, itermax denotes the
maximum number of iterations, Xij denotes the position of the i-th
sparrow in the j-th dimension, and α is a random number in (0,1]. R2
represents the current hazard level value, and ST represents the hazard
threshold. Q is a random number with a normal distribution, and L de­
notes a matrix consisting of 1. When R2 < ST, the current area is safe and
sparrows continue to search food. Indeed, the discovers find enemies
and sparrows flee quickly (i.e., R2 > ST).
Meanwhile, joiners often mingled with producers to participate in
searching and obtaining food, The adaptability of joiners also varies, the
lower the adaptability value means the more difficult in foraging food.
The identity of discoverers and joiners is always dynamic, and a joiner
may also be attracted to become a producer.
2.4. Whale optimization algorithm
The WOA is a class of metaheuristic optimization algorithms pro­
posed by Mirjalili et al. [49]. The algorithm is inspired by the special
predatory behavior of humpback whales in the ocean, which is called
bubble-net. The WOA mimics the behavior of whales in encircling prey,
bubble-net feeding, and searching for food in the ocean as shown in
Fig. 3. The WOA employs a search space exploration mechanism using
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Construction and Building Materials 409 (2023) 133911
two basic steps, namely, the encircling and the bubble-net hunting op­
erations. These two steps are based on the positions of the best indi­
vidual and the current position of each whale.
Humpback whales need to search for prey before start hunting, the
searching process can be represented by the following equation:
{
D = |CXrand − X(t)|
(5)
X(n + 1) = Xrand − AD
Before hunting, the prey was besieged by humpback whales, and this
behavior can be represented in the model by Eq. (6):
{
(6)
X(n + 1) = X * (n) − AD
where n denotes the current number of iterations; A and C are co­
efficients, X* (n) denotes the optimal position of the whale at the current
iteration, and X(n) represents the current position of the whale.
Humpback whales approach their targets with a spiral motion in
hunting, and this behavioral pattern can be represented by Eq. (7).
{ *
X (n) − AD, p < Pi
X(n + 1) = (7)
X * (n) + Dp ebl cos(2π l)
The Dp in the formula represents the distance between the prey and the
whale, b is a constant used to define the helix, and l is a constant within
[-1,1]. The coefficient A reflects the distance between the humpback
whale and its prey. If A > 1 means that the humpback whale chose to
abandon the current prey and move away from it to continue searching
for a better prey. Otherwise, humpback whale starts to attack the prey.
3. Database preparation
3.1. Data source
The three-dimensional discrete element method (DEM) has shown
J. Zhou et al.
Fig. 4. Definition of each surface morphology parameter.
remarkable success in solving problems in geotechnical and structural
engineering fields. A number of scholars have utilized DEM to simulate
various mechanical problems in soil and rock, and to explore the cor­
relation between different parameters and material behavior
[26,32,46,56,74,77,95,111]. Numerical simulation methods are typi­
cally time-intensive, which can limit their utility for real-time or rapid
analysis. As an alternative, machine learning models can be trained
using numerical simulation parameters as inputs to predict simulation
results or to optimize simulation parameters. Recent studies have shown
that these hybrid methods are more efficient and accurate than relying
solely on numerical simulations [34,45,54,83,98]. Therefore, the pre­
sent study aims to utilize data from random soil structure interface shear
tests simulated by DEM to further explore the correlation between
different parameters and the material behavior.
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Construction and Building Materials 409 (2023) 133911
3.2. Data description
Sadowski et al. [59] investigated the microscopic changes at the
interface between the concrete overlay and the substrate. Four different
surface morphologies were obtained using different surface treatment
techniques: T1-raw, T2-as cast, T3-ground and T4-shotblasted. Chen
et al. [14] collected a number of surface morphological parameters using
Mountains Map to parse 60 surface profiles based four types of concrete
surfaces from previous studies. These surface morphology parameters
contain amplitude parameters [30]: the minimum height value (Pv), the
maximum height value (Pp), the height difference between the
maximum and minimum values (Pz), average height of the profile (Pc),
arithmetic mean difference of the profile (Pa), deviation of the root
mean square value of the profile (Pq), skewness of the height distribu­
tion in the profile (Psk), kurtosis of the height distribution of the profiles
(Pku); spacing parameters: average width of outline elements (PSm);
J. Zhou et al. Construction and Building Materials 409 (2023) 133911

Fig. 5. Pearson correlation coefficient analysis of surface topography parameters.

hybrid parameters: root mean square slope of the profile (Pdq); material correlations of Pp, Pv, Pz, Pc, Pa and Pdc are eliminated. Thus, the input
ratio curves and correlation parameters: material ratio of the profile parameters considered in this paper to predict interface shear strength of
(Pmr); and peak parameters: relative material ratio of the profile, soil-structure are Pq, Psk, Pku, PSm, Pdq, Pmr and Ppc, and the output
number of peaks (Ppc) [30], as described in Fig. 4. parameter is represented by IEP.
Based aforementioned factor (particle properties) that affect the
mechanical properties of soil-structure in Section 1, the database used in 3.4. Evaluation indicators
this study contains three different average particle sizes, i.e., D50 = 0.35
mm (4444 particles and 120 shear tests), D50 = 0.53 mm (10, 000 par­ The performance evaluation is essential to verify the efficacy of the
ticles and 240 shear tests) and D50 = 0.80 mm (22,500 particles and 120 established ML models [58,103,106]. In the study, the mean absolute
shear tests). Chen et al. [14] applied an index named the interface ef­ error (MAE) is a metric that measures the average absolute difference
ficiency (IE) to normalize the interface stress of soil-structure, which can between predicted and actual values, the mean absolute percentage
be calculated by the following expression: error (MAPE) provides a measure of the accuracy of the predictions in
percentage terms, the coefficient of determination (R2) provides a
tanδ
IE = (8) measure of the goodness of fit of the model, and the root mean square
tanϕ
error (RMSE) provides a measure of the average magnitude of the errors
where tanδ and tanϕ represent the friction coefficient of interface and in the predictions. The application of these evaluation indices is detailed
pure soil, respectively. Furthermore, the peak IE (IEP) can be calculated in [40,64,103–108,110]. In this paper, MAE, MAPE, R2, and RMSE were
by their peak friction coefficients to represent the shear strength of soil- used as the evaluation indices of the proposed models, and these indices
structure. can be defined as follows:
m ⃒ ⃒
1 ∑ ⃒∧ ⃒
MAE = ⃒yi − yi ⃒
⃒ ⃒ (9)
m i=1
3.3. Data processing
⃒ ⃒
m ⃒ ∧ ⃒
In ML, highly correlated variables can lead to multicollinearity, 100\% ∑ ⃒yi − yi ⃒
MAPE = ⃒ ⃒ (10)
which can cause issues in model training and affect the interpretation of m ⃒ y ⃒
i=1 ⃒ i ⃒
the model. The Pearson correlation coefficient expresses the degree of
similarity between two variables, which is widely used to reflect the ∑m ∧
degree of similarity between calculated features and categories [16]. By (yi − yi )2
R2 = 1 − ∑i=1 (11)
identifying highly correlated variables, the number of input variables
m 2
i=1 (yi − yi )
can be reduced and the performance of the model can be improved [63]. √̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅
In general, input parameters with high correlation coefficients (Pearson 1 ∑ m
∧
RMSE = (yi − yi )2 (12)
correlation coefficients above 0.8) usually need to be filtered to prevent m i=1
data redundancy [63]. When the correlation between two input pa­
rameters is more than 0.80, a trade-off is typically made. The surface ∧
topographical parameters of database were examined using Pearson where yi , yi and yi represent the predicted value, actual value and
correlation analysis to eliminate data redundancy, and the findings are average value, respectively. m indicates the use of training or testing
displayed in Fig. 5. As can be seen in this picture, the Pearson correlation samples.
coefficient calculation results illustrate that the association between Pp,
Pv, Pz, Pc, Pa, Pq, and Pdc is stronger than others. Therefore, the high

6
J. Zhou et al. Construction and Building Materials 409 (2023) 133911

Fig. 6. Flowchart of RF-based models (DA-RF, WOA-RF, SSA-RF).

all data were normalized to [-1, 1]. Cross-validation (CV) improves

Table 1
model performance and reduces the risk of overfitting by providing
The parameter setting of hybrid models.
more accurate estimates of model performance on new data. It also
Hybrid Number of Population Objectives of optimization maximizes the use of existing data and improves the results reliability,
model iterations size
making a valuable tool for model evaluation and selection [92]. In this
DA-RF 600 10, 20, 50, the number of trees, the study, a five-fold CV is used to prevent overfitting of the proposed
100 maximum depth of trees
models. In RF regression, the optimization objectives are usually the
SSA-RF 600 10, 20, 50,
100 number of trees and the maximum depth of the trees [57]. Therefore, the
WOA-RF 600 10, 20, 50, number of trees and the maximum depth of trees are optimized by DA,
100 SSA, and WOA in this paper. For optimizing ML models, the population
size and number of iterations are artificially set to control the search
process within a reasonable time frame and avoid overfitting or
3.5. Rf-based hybrid models
underfitting. The population size represents the number of solutions or
individuals that exist in each generation of the optimization algorithm,
The database of surface topography parameters in this paper con­
while the number of iterations determines the number of generations to
tains a total of 480 sets of data (120 data sets for D50 = 0.35 mm, 240
be created during the optimization process [93]. The parameter settings
data sets for D50 = 0.53 mm, and 120 data sets for D50 = 0.80 mm in the
for the three types of hybrid models (DA-RF, SSA-RF, and WOA-RF) are
data set, D50 indicates soil particle size). As shown in Fig. 6, these data
shown in Table 1. During the merit-seeking iteration of the model, the
are randomly divided into a training set (75 %) and a test set (25 %), and
average RMSE values produced from the five-fold CV training is
employed as the fitness evaluation function [87]. Finally, the perfor­
mance of the proposed models for predicting the IEp is evaluated
Table 2
comprehensively using MAE, MAPE, R2, and RMSE. The flowchart of
The parameter settings of RF, ELM and SVR-RBF.
constructing DA-RF, WOA-RF and SSA-RF models for predicting the
Model Hyperparameter Typical default values Reference
shear strength of structural surfaces is shown in Fig. 6.
RF mtry p/3 for regression [57]
samples size n 4. Results and discussion
node size 5 (for regression)
number of trees 1000
splitting rule Gini impurity 4.1. RF, ELM and SVR-RBF models
ELM the number of hidden nodes p [78]
activation function Sigmoid function In light of the advantages of RF model over traditional machine
regularization coefficient 0.1
learning models in preventing overfitting, ELM and SVR-RBF models
SVR-RBF regularization parameter C 1.0 [18]
kernel coefficient gamma 1/p were selected as comparison groups to conduct predictive comparisons
epsilon for the loss function 0.1 for IEp in order to evaluate the relative effectiveness of each model. In RF
model, the number of randomly drawn candidate variables (mtry) is
Note: n is the number of observations and p is the number of variables in the
dataset.
usually set to p/3 (p is the number of variables in the dataset) in some RF

7
J. Zhou et al.
Fig. 7. . Performance of ELM, SVR-RBF and RF for IEp prediction.
software packages for regression problems. The choice of the sample size
parameter is usually a trade-off between stability and accuracy of the
tree, and is expressed here in terms of the number of observations n (n is
the number of observations). The node size parameter specifies the
minimum number of observations in the terminal nodes, and in some
standard packages, the default 1 is for classification and 5 is for
regression. Therefore, node size is set equal to 5 to generate model for
predicting IEp. The number of trees in a forest is not adjustable in the
classical sense, but should be set high enough, usually to 500 or 1000
[57], and it is set equal to 1000 in this paper. The splitting rule can be
seen as one of the core features of performance RF, and the classic Gini
impurity is chosen as the splitting rule in this paper. For other parameter
settings of ELM and SVR-RBF, refer to Table 2, and all models were
trained and evaluated on the same training and test sets.
The performance results of ELM, SVR-RBF and RF for IEp prediction
8
Construction and Building Materials 409 (2023) 133911
are shown in Fig. 7. Through an analysis of Fig. 7(a), (b), and (c), it was
observed that the performance of ELM was satisfactory in the D50 = 0.35
mm data set. However, ELM exhibited poor performance in the D50 =
0.80 mm dataset, with R2 values of 0.748 and 0.6991 in the training and
test sets, respectively. Additionally, ELM demonstrated significant
overfitting in the D50 = 0.53 mm dataset for surface topography pa­
rameters. These findings indicate that ELM may have limited noise
control capabilities when dealing with certain surface topography
parameter data sets. In Fig. 7 (d), (e), (f), it is observed that SVR-RBF
exhibits considerable overfitting in both D50 = 0.35 mm and D50 =
0.80 mm datasets. Moreover, even though there is no overfitting in the
surface topography parameter dataset with D50 = 0.53 mm, the pre­
diction performance is poor as indicated by the low R2 values of 0.6511
and 0.6383 in the training and test sets, respectively. Fig. 7(g), (h), and
(i) show that RF performs exceptionally well in all three types of surface
J. Zhou et al.
Fig. 8. Iteration curves of three types of hybrid models DA-RF, SSA-RF and WOA-RF.
topography data sets without any significant overfitting. Therefore, it
can be concluded that RF has superior noise control capabilities for
surface topography parameters and can more accurately identify the
relationship between surface topography parameters and IEp, making it
a more appropriate choice for predicting IEp than ELM and SVR-RBF.
4.2. Model validity judgment
In contrast to other commonly used error assessment metrics like
MAE, RMSE is preferred for quantifying the difference between true and
predicted values as it avoids the need for absolute values. This property
makes RMSE a crucial factor in evaluating some model parameters
where determining the sensitivity of MAE is challenging [10]. By
monitoring the change in RMSE in RF, the hyperparameters can be
tuned to minimize the model fitness value. In this study, RMSE is chosen
as a fitness function for model optimization. The iteration curves of three
hybrid models with different population sizes are presented in Fig. 8.
The performance of a random forest model optimized using three
optimization algorithms, DA, SSA, and WOA, was examined for pre­
dicting the interface stress of soil-structure based on surface morphology
parameters. The effect of population size on model performance was
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Construction and Building Materials 409 (2023) 133911
assessed by plotting fitness curves based on four different population
sizes, i.e., 10, 20, 50, and 100. Results indicate that the WOA-RF model
demonstrated the best overall performance, achieving the highest fitness
value across all population sizes, with a population size of 10 yielding
the best performance. In contrast, the DA-RF model showed the slowest
improvement rate, with a population size of 20 yielding the best per­
formance. The SSA-RF model exhibited intermediate performance, with
a population size of 100 yielding the best performance. These findings
highlight the importance of selecting appropriate optimization algo­
rithms and population sizes for optimizing the random forest model for
predicting the IEp based on surface morphology parameters.
4.3. Hybrid models performance evaluation
Fig. 9 intuitively shows the comparison between the predicted IEP
value and the actual IEP value. In these diagrams, each color blob rep­
resents the distribution of the predicted and actual values for a class of
particle sizes (i.e., red: D50 = 0.35 mm; blue: D50 = 0.53 mm; green: D50
= 0.80 mm). The predicted value and the actual value jointly locate the
position of the data point in the graph. In other words, the closer the data
point is to the diagonal dotted line, the smaller the difference between
J. Zhou et al. Construction and Building Materials 409 (2023) 133911

Fig. 9. Distribution of prediction results and histogram of differences for three types of hybrid models.

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J. Zhou et al. Construction and Building Materials 409 (2023) 133911

Fig. 10. Comprehensive information on different hybrid model evaluation indicators.

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J. Zhou et al. Construction and Building Materials 409 (2023) 133911

Fig. 11. Comparison of the overall performance score of each model (The marked is the optimal model).

the predicted value and the actual value. The range of the difference
Table 3
distribution between the true and expected values of particles of each
Comparison of the prediction effect of WOA-RF (Pop = 10) and previous study.
particle size and the distribution is visually represented by the histogram
of the difference distribution in the top right corner. The distributions Method R2
Training set
results of predicted values obtained by three hybrid RF models are all
centered around the dotted line, highlighting the high level of prediction WOA-RF(Pop = 10) D50 = 0.35 mm 0.9473
D50 = 0.53 mm 0.9262
accuracy. The DA-RF (pop = 20) model demonstrated a prediction error
D50 = 0.80 mm 0.9352
range of 0.08, while the WOA-RF (pop = 10) and SSA-RF (pop = 100) BNGR [14] 0.88
models showed lower error ranges of 0.06. These findings suggest that Testing set
the WOA-RF (pop = 10) and SSA-RF (pop = 100) models may be more WOA-RF(Pop = 10) D50 = 0.35 mm 0.9404
accurate in predicting interface stress of soil-structure (IEp) than the DA- D50 = 0.53 mm 0.8433
D50 = 0.80 mm 0.9352
RF (pop = 20) model, given their lower prediction error ranges.
BNGR [14] 0.77
The Taylor diagram representation was utilized to assess the per­
formance of RF, SVR-RBF, ELM, DA-RF, SSA-RF, and WOA-RF in pre­
dicting the shear strength of structural surfaces, as illustrated in Fig. 10. WOA-RF (pop = 10) significantly outperformed other models, with
It is evident from the diagram that the data points associated with DA- WOA-RF (pop = 10) performing the best (Training set: MAE = 0.0145,
RF, SSA-RF, and WOA-RF are closer to the observation point than MAPE = 1.9866, R2 = 0.9473, RMSE = 0.0178 at D50 = 0.35 mm; MAE
those of unoptimized RF model, implying that these models exhibit = 0.0181, MAPE = 2.6417, R2 = 0.9262, RMSE = 0.0237 at D50 = 0.53
lower RMSE in their predictions. Moreover, the smaller azimuth angle mm; MAE = 0.0179, MAPE = 2.5310, R2 = 0.9352, RMSE = 0.0224 at
signifies that DA-RF, SSA-RF, and WOA-RF exhibit higher correlation D50 = 0.80 mm; Testing set: MAE = 0.0210, MAPE = 2.8924, R2 =
coefficients [70]. These findings indicate that combining DA, SSA, and 0.9404, RMSE = 0.0252 at D50 = 0.35 mm; MAE = 0.0273, MAPE =
WOA is help for selecting effective hyperparameters of RF model and 4.0294, R2 = 0.8433, RMSE = 0.0362 at D50 = 0.53 mm; MAE = 0.0216,
improving predictive performance of initial RF model. This is an effi­ MAPE = 3.0, R2 = 0.9352, RMSE = 0.0224 at D50 = 0.80 mm), sug­
cient optimization search that captures the intrinsic relationship be­ gesting that the WOA algorithm with a population size of 10 can effec­
tween the surface morphology parameters and IEp. tively search for optimal hyperparameter combinations and significantly
To comprehensively evaluate the predictive performance of DA-RF, improve the ability of RF model to capture the intrinsic relationship
SSA-RF, and WOA-RF for IEp, this study computed evaluation parame­ between surface morphology parameters and IEp.
ters for each model and ranked them based on scores from high to low. Table 3 presents the comparative analysis of the prediction perfor­
The resulting comprehensive evaluation is presented in Fig. 11, where a mance of the WOA-RF model proposed in this study with the published
larger fan-shaped area denotes a higher score and better performance. results by Chen et al. [14]. The analysis reveals that the proposed WOA-
Specifically, Fig. 11(a) compares the performance of DA-RF in predict­ RF model outperforms the previous approaches (based on the same
ing IEp under different population sizes and suggests that setting the database) in predicting IEp. The results indicate that the WOA-RF model
population size to 20 can better optimize the hyperparameters of RF. exhibits good prediction accuracy on both the training and test datasets,
Additionally, in Fig. 11(b) and (c), SSA-RF (pop = 100) and WOA-RF without any significant overfitting. Therefore, it is recommended to use
(pop = 10) exhibited the best performance, respectively. Finally, the WOA-RF model as an effective tool for predicting IEp.
Fig. 11(d) provides a comprehensive comparison of RF, ELM, SVR-RBF,
DA-RF (pop = 20), SSA-RF (pop = 100), and WOA-RF (pop = 10) in
predicting IEp. The results indicate that both SSA-RF (pop = 100) and

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J. Zhou et al. Construction and Building Materials 409 (2023) 133911

Fig. 12. Importance distribution of each parameter of the optimal model.

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J. Zhou et al. Construction and Building Materials 409 (2023) 133911

Table 4 However, this marginal decline underscores the substantial influence of

Comparison of WOA-RF results between the dataset with Pmr removed and the these identified variables. The fact that the model retains a large pro­
original dataset. portion of its accuracy, even when other variables are excluded, un­
WOA-RF (Pop = 10) MAE MAPE R2 RMSE equivocally demonstrates the paramount importance of the selected
Without Pmr
variables in predicting shear strength based on surface morphology
D50 = 0.35 mm 0.0244 3.3677 0.9329 0.0280 parameters. This observation not only validates our variable selection
D50 = 0.53 mm 0.0288 4.2157 0.8348 0.0369 but also emphasizes the potential efficiency in scenarios where mea­
D50 = 0.80 mm 0.0218 3.1296 0.9269 0.0277 surement or computation resources might be constrained, thereby
Original
enabling researchers to focus primarily on these pivotal parameters.
D50 = 0.35 mm 0.021 2.8924 0.9404 0.0252
D50 = 0.53 mm 0.0273 4.0294 0.8433 0.0362
D50 = 0.80 mm 0.0216 3.0816 0.9313 0.0276 5. Conclusions

4.4. Parameter importance analysis
Feature importance analysis is a crucial function in Random Forest
(RF) algorithms. On the one hand, it aids the model in recognizing sig­
nificant features, eliminating noise interference, and mitigating over­
fitting risks. On the other hand, feature importance plays a pivotal role
in the interpretability of the model. In the RF model, the significance of a
variable refers to the contribution of variable to the model [71]. Brei­
man et al. [5] considered more sensitive variables have a higher Gini
index, which is computed as follows:
∑
B Based on the analysis of the model results, RF outperforms ELM and
Gini(Xa ) = P(Xa = Yb )(1 − P(Xa = Yb ))
b− 1
(13)
∑
B
=1− P(Xa = Yb )2
b the optimized RF model using WOA with a population size of 10 ach­
where Gini(Xa) represents the Gini index. P(Xa = Yb) is the probabilities.
Xa = Yb represents the estimated values.
Fig. 12 shows the importance of each input variable in the RF model
based on three different particle sizes (i.e., D50 = 0.35 mm, D50 = 0.53
mm, and D50 = 0.80 mm). Based on the feature importance analysis and
the data presented in the figure, it was observed that Pdq and Pq exhibit
the highest importance scores among the surface morphological pa­
rameters. This highlights their close association with IEp and their crit­
ical role in predicting IEp using the RF model. These results also suggest
that adjusting Pdq and Pq may have a more significant impact on IEp in
numerical simulations. Additionally, the moderate importance scores of
PSm, Pku, Psk, and Ppc imply that these parameters contribute to the
prediction of IEp, albeit to a lesser extent than Pdq and Pq. Nevertheless,
their intrinsic relationship with IEp remains relatively strong.
On the other hand, the lower importance score of Pmr implies a
weaker association with IEp and a reduced impact on the prediction of
IEp using the RF model. Consequently, this parameter may not be as
crucial as other surface morphological parameters for predicting IEp.
To conclude, Pdq and Pq are closely related to IEp and are critical for
predicting IEp using the RF model. These parameters should be the focus
of adjustment when tuning simulation parameters in numerical simu­
lations. Additionally, the potential effects of PSm, Pku, Psk, and Ppc on
IEp should be taken into account. Finally, due to its low correlation with
IEp, Pmr can be considered last. The parameter importance analysis in
this study provides insights into the various connections between
different surface topography parameters and IEp, and forms a basis for
optimizing parameter adjustment in numerical simulations.
To further validate the role of feature importance analysis, the least
important feature, Pmr, was eliminated from the dataset. The currently
most prominent WOA-RF (Pop = 10) was then utilized to retrain the
dataset. The results are presented in Table 4.
It is evident that upon removing Pmr from the datasets with D50 =
0.35 mm, D50 = 0.53 mm, and D50 = 0.80 mm, there was a slight
decrease in the R2 values, which represent model accuracy. Conversely,
error indicators such as MAE, MAPE, and RMSE experienced a slight
increase. This suggests that although Pmr has a low importance level in
predicting IEp, it remains an integral part of accurately forecasting IEp.
The interaction between soil structural surfaces has been the focus of
study in geotechnical engineering, and numerical simulation has
become an important study tool for many scholars due to the complex
field environment and the difficulty of conducting multiple types of
experiments. In this study, 480 sets of numerical simulation data from
DEM were used, including 120 sets with D50 = 0.35 mm, 240 sets with
D50 = 0.53 mm, and 120 sets with D50 = 0.80 mm. Several models
including ELM, SVR-RBF, RF (not optimized), DA-RF, SSA-RF, and
WOA-RF were constructed with seven types of surface morphology pa­
rameters (Pq, Psk, Pku, PSm, Pdq, Pmr and Ppc) as training objects to
predict IEp.
SVR-RBF, demonstrating better prediction performance, a stronger
ability to capture the intrinsic correlation between surface topography
parameters and IEp, and the ability to prevent overfitting. Furthermore,
ieves the best IEp prediction performance. This indicates that WOA has
an excellent hyperparameter search capability for the surface topog­
raphy parameter-IEp relationship problem in RF.
Based on the feature importance analysis, it was found that Pdq and
Pq played crucial roles in predicting IEp. Meanwhile, PSm, Pku, Psk, and
Ppc showed less contribution, and the correlation between Pmr and IEp
was weak. If only parameters with salient features are considered, there
lies an inherent risk of overlooking the subtle interactions amongst less
prominent features, which, collectively, may exert a significant impact
on the prediction outcomes. The data used in this study were derived
from numerical simulations that incorporated surface morphology data
from multiple prior studies, indicating their generalizability. However,
caution must be exercised when applying the findings to different soil
structural surface environments. Future study should incorporate a more
comprehensive range of surface topography parameters and adjust the
model parameters to optimize feature values, thereby enhancing the
accuracy and reliability of the predictive model.
CRediT authorship contribution statement
Jian Zhou: Writing – review & editing, Supervision, Methodology,
Funding acquisition, Conceptualization. Peixi Yang: Writing – original
draft, Software, Methodology, Data curation. Chuanqi Li: Writing –
review & editing, Visualization, Formal analysis. Kun Du: Writing –
review & editing, Validation, Supervision, Investigation, Formal
analysis.
Declaration of Competing Interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing financial
interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence
the work reported in this paper.
Data availability
Data will be made available on request.

14
J. Zhou et al.
Acknowledgements
This research is partially supported by the National Natural Science
Foundation Project of China (42177164), and the Distinguished Youth
Science Foundation of Hunan Province of China (2022JJ10073).
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