Study on temperature field and settlement of thawing soil under static and dynamic loading

A series of tests were conducted to analyze temperature field distribution and thawing settlement of a thawing soil under static and dynamic loading at various cooling and thawing temperatures. The results demonstrate: (1) the temperature field distribution of the thawing soil was not significantly influenced by the loading form under the tested loading conditions; similar results were obtained for samples at different dynamic loading frequencies and different dynamic loading amplitudes, which verified the independence of loading form and temperature field; (2) changed temperature field distributions were found in thawing soil with different cooling and thawing temperatures, and the cooling and thawing temperature of the samples were the main factors affecting their temperature distributions; (3) under the tested conditions, thawing settlements were little influenced by the thawing temperature and the dynamic loading frequency; and (4) a linear relationship existed between the thawing settlement and the cooling temperature, and a logarithmic function could be used to describe the relationship between the thawing settlement and the loading amplitude.