1708 Constitutive Modeling of Geomaterials: Development, Implementation, and Performance Assessment

Majid T. Manzari, George Washington University

Richard A. Regueiro, University of Colorado, Boulder

Waiching (Steve) Sun, Columbia University

Hoe I. Ling, Columbia University

Analysis of many civil infrastructure systems involves an accurate modeling of geomaterials,  In particular, the complex nature of cohesive and cohesionless soils in dry, partially saturated and saturated conditions pose significant modeling challenges when the material is subjected to various stress/strain paths that are caused by monotonic and cyclic loading.  Moreover, pressure dependence, rate sensitivity, textural/fabric changes due to mechanical-bio-thermal-chemical processes, marked reduction of mean effective stresses in saturated soils subjected to cyclic loading are key features that need to be addressed in many geomechanics application.  Recent advances in constitutive modeling of geomaterials have provided promising platforms for tackling many of these challenging phenomena.  In addition to the challenges involved in the formulation of a suitable constitutive model for geomaterials, efficient implementation of the newly developed models that cover a wide range of strains poses an additional set of challenges that are rarely encountered in other materials. Hence many of the implementation techniques that are originally developed for other engineering materials materials face significant challenges when applied to constitutive models for geomaterials. 

This mini-symposium aims at bringing together researchers who are developing new constitutive models for geomaterials, implementing existing or new material models for large scale simulations of geomechanics problems, or assessing the performance of the existing or newly developed models in a variety of boundary value problems ranging from quasi-static to dynamic loading conditions.  Contributions on advanced elastoplastic, viscoplastic, and damage plasticity models formulated within standard or enhanced (gradient, micromorphic, etc) continuum framework for saturated and partially saturated geomaterials as well as micromechanics and neural-network based models are particularly welcome.