Sharif Digital Repository

The main purpose of this study is to develop the Hollow Cylinder Apparatus (HCA) for unsaturated testing on granular materials and to investigate the effect of stress anisotropy on dynamic parameters of soils like shear modulus and damping ratio. Direction of loading and the magnitude of intermediate principal stress have significant effect on the anisotropic response of soils. In many of in-situ loading the direction of major principal stress does not coincide with deposition direction of soil or because of the three dimensional loading condition of soil, the effect of the intermediate principal stress cannot be ignored. On the other hand, in many areas, soils are in unsaturated condition.... 

Wide lands in IRAN are covered by the “Hydro – Collapsible” soils. These types of soils possess high apparent shear strength in their natural condition but are highly susceptible to volume collapse upon wetting. This behavior is generally attributed to their open, unstable soil fabric and their weak inter-particle bonding forces, which together yield a soil void structure that is susceptible to collapse.
Previous studies rarely investigated the roles of stress state level, matric suction and stress path on the hydro-mechanical nature of the collapse phenomenon. Also most studies dealt with conducting laboratory tests on remolded soil specimens through which the role of natural soil... 

Evaluation of the seismic-induced settlement of an unsaturated soil layer depends on several variables, among which the small strain shear modulus, Gmax, and soil’s state of stress have been demonstrated to be of particular significance. Recent interpretation of trends in Gmax revealed considerable effects of the degree of saturation and hydraulic hysteresis on the shear stiffness of soils in unsaturated states. Accordingly, the soil layer is expected to experience different settlement behaviors depending on the soil saturation and seasonal weathering conditions. In this study, a semi-empirical formulation was adapted to extend an existing Gmax model to infer hysteretic effects along... 

The deposits in many regions in Iran, particularly eastern zones like Golestan, Semnan, Khorasan, Yazd, Kerman, Hormozgan, Sistan and Baluchestan provinces consist of Aeolian deposits of loess, which are categorized as collapsible soils. This kind of soil show sufficient shear strength and low deformability in dry or natural condition. However, if a structure is built on the soil and water seeps or infiltrates into the soil due to several reasons such as sewer leakage, water seepage or heavy precipitations in a way that its moisture reaches to a critical value, the interparticle bonds may break or the present suction in the soil may decrease in a way that the soil experiences sudden... 

Shear modulus and damping ratio are the most important parameters for evaluating and designing the performance of geotechnical systems under dynamic loads. According to the definition, the secant shear modulus is the slope of the hysteresis shear stress-shear strain loop. Also, the damping ratio indicates the dissipation of wave energy during propagation in the soil. This research presents an experimental laboratory study on the effect of non-plastic fines content and hydraulic hysteresis on the Gmax of unsaturated sand-silt mixtures. A significant part of the previous research has been done to determine Shear modulus and damping ratio parameters. It has been done in completely saturated or...