Unsaturated Soils

Course content

Interfacial tension, cavitation, capillarity. Soil suction, water retention and drainage of porous media. Micromechanics/microhydraulics of unsaturated soil. Testing of unsaturated soils: suction measurement and control, volume measurement. Flow and balance laws, hydraulic conductivity function, 1-D flow, infiltration and evaporation. Shear strength; effective stress and independent state variables approaches. Deformation and consolidation; expansive and collapsing of soils. Constitutive modeling.