Critical State Sedimentation Line of Soft Marine Clays

The compression behavior responsible for unity sensitivity is very valuable in quantitative assessment of the effects of soil structure on the compression behavior of soft marine sediments. However, the quantitative assessment of such effects is not possible because of unavailability of the formula for the compression curve of marine sediments responsible for unit sensitivity. In this study, the relationship between the remolded state and the conventional critical state line is presented in the deviator stress versus mean effective stress plot. The analysis indicates that the remolded state is on the conventional critical state line obtained at a relatively small strain. Thus, a unique critical state sedimentation line for marine sediments of unit sensitivity is proposed. The comparison between the critical state sedimentation line proposed in this study and the existing normalized consolidation curves obtained from conventional oedometer tests on remolded soils or reconstituted soils explains well the

Remolded Undrained Strength of Soils

Extensive data of undrained shear strength for various remolded soils are compiled to normalize the remolded undrained strength. Remolded soils have a wide spectrum of liquid limits ranging from 25% to 412%. It is found that the remolded undrained strength is a function of water content and liquid limit. Furthermore, a simple index designated as normalized water content w * is introduced for normalizing remolded undrained strength for various soils. The normalized water content w * is the ratio of water content to liquid limit. The relationship between the remolded undrained strength and the normalized water content can be expressed by a simple equation. The new simple equation is not only valuable theoretically for helping in assessing the in situ mechanical behavior, but also useful to ocean engineering practice.

DEM investigation on the effect of sample preparation on the shear behavior of granular soil

The effect of initial fabric anisotropy produced by sample preparation on the shear behavior of granular soil is investigated by performing discrete element method （DEM） simulations of fourteen biaxial tests in drained conditions. Numerical test specimens are prepared by three means： gravitational deposition, multi-layer compression, and isotropic compression, such that different initial inherent soil fabrics are created. The DEM simulation results show that initial fabric anisotropy exerts a considerable effect on the shear behavior of granular soil, and that the peak stress ratio and peak dilatancy increase with an increase in the fabric index an that is estimated from the contact orientations. The stress-dilatancy relationship is found to be independent of the initial fabric anisotropy. The anisotropy related to the contact orientation and contact normal force accounts for the main contribution to the mobilized friction angle. Also, the occurrence of contractive shear response in an initial shearing stage is accompanied by the most intense particle rearrangement and microstructural reorganization, regardless of the sample preparation method. Furthermore, the uniqueness of the critical state line in e-logp＇ and q-p＇ plots is observed, suggesting that the influence of initial fabric anisotropy is erased at large shear strains.