江苏及邻近地区地震视应力特征研究

采用江苏省数字地震台网记录的地震波形资料,利用震源位移谱低频水平与拐角频率计算了2000~2010年江苏及邻近地区561个ML≥1.5中小地震视应力值。结果显示,江苏及邻近地区的地震视应力平均值为0.91 MPa,与中国大陆的平均水平相当。视应力与震级无明显的线性关系,在震级相对较大时表现出一定的高震级对应高视应力的特点。视应力高值地区主要集中在江苏中部至南黄海海域,次高值集中分布在郯庐断裂带中南段的苏鲁交界地区、安徽段固镇至定远附近地区和肥东、巢湖一带,反映了以上地区较高的地震活动水平及地壳应力状态。不同区域ML2震级档视应力的差异性基本反映了区域地质环境、构造活动等特征的差异。     

Effects of scour-hole dimensions and soil stress history on the behavior of laterally loaded piles in soft clay under scour conditions

Bridge pile foundations in the midst of water current are often subjected to scour, which induces the loss of soil support around the piles and thus results in a significant decrease of foundation capacities or even the failure of bridges. In the current practice, when the scour-affected behavior of the pile foundations is analyzed, either the whole scour-hole geometry or the possible changes in the stress history of the remaining soils is often ignored. In reality, however, scouring creates scour holes with certain dimensions around the pile foundations and the remaining soils that are not scoured away undergo an unloading process at the same time, which will increase the over-consolidation ratios of the remaining soils and accordingly changes of their mechanical properties. This paper examines the behavior of laterally loaded piles in soft clay under scour conditions by using the p-y method. The conventional p-y curves have been modified appropriately to reasonably reflect the effects of three-dimensional scour-hole geometry as well as the stress history of the soils, with the aid of integration of Mindlin’s fundamental solutions. A field test is used to serve as a reference case and to investigate the effects of stress history, scour depth, scour width, and scour-hole slope angle on the responses of laterally loaded piles in soft clay. The results indicate that neglecting the stress history effect can be unconservative for scour-affected pile foundations in soft clay, whereas neglect of the scour-hole dimensions and geometry would lead to over-conservative predictions/design of the laterally loaded piles under scour condition.     

Influence of the intermediate principal stress and principal stress direction on the mechanical behavior of cohesionless soils using the discrete element method

In this paper, the Discrete Element Method (DEM) is employed to numerically explore the response of hollow cylinder specimens of granular soils under complex stress paths. Two series of numerical tests are conducted to clarify the effects of the principal stress direction α and the intermediate principal stress through the b-value on the mechanical response of granular materials. The effects of α and b-value on the non-coaxiality of the principal stress and the principal plastic strain increment directions are investigated. It is observed that b-value and α significantly affect the non-coaxial behavior of granular materials. Finally, the results are discussed and compared with those obtained from physical laboratory tests.     

Buckling failures of reserved thin pillars under the combined action of in-plane and lateral hydrostatic compressive forces

The reasons that pillars with small width-to-height ratios fail remain unclear. This study established a mechanical model for the buckling failure of a thin pillar subjected to compressive forces to investigate the stability of reserved thin pillars (RTPs) on both sides of mining units during barrier pillar recovery. The critical buckling stress of the thin pillar was obtained using the energy variational method, and its relationship to the aspect ratio (length-to-width ratio) was investigated. The buckling instability of RTPs can be determined by comparing the RTP stress obtained from numerical simulations with the buckling stress derived from the mechanical model.     

Numerical investigation of the opening effect on the mechanical behaviours in rocks under uniaxial loading using hybrid continuum-discrete element method

Openings including their size, shape and distribution in rock play a significant role in the performance of rock related structures. The well-established knowledge in this area can contribute to the engineering practices, for example, underground space design, planning and optimisation in Civil and Mining Engineering and wellbore stability in Drilling Engineering, among others. Thus, understanding the failure mechanism of rock with openings is theoretically and practically meaningful. Laboratory testing on rock or rock-like materials with openings have been studied extensively in the literature, which, however, primarily focuses on the cracks/fractures. In this paper, a comprehensive numerical study on the effect of non-banded openings, i.e., circular, rectangular, and triangular opening, on the rock mechanical behaviour is performed using a hybrid continuum-discrete element method. It is revealed that the proposed simulation method can reproduce reasonably the crack initiation and propagation, and predict well the change of the mechanical behaviour due to the openings. In addition, the influence of the opening shape and opening ratio (=area of opening/specimen area) on the mechanical behaviour is also investigated.     

A comprehensive study on the parameters setting in smoothed particle hydrodynamics (SPH) method applied to hydrodynamics problems

Smoothed particle hydrodynamics (SPH) is a meshfree, Lagrangian particle method which has advantages in handling solids with extremely large deformation. Like any other numerical methods, cares must be taken to ensure its desirable accuracy and stability through considering several correction techniques in calculation. The selection of values for parameters in those correction approaches is a key step in SPH simulation, which is always difficult for new beginners to deal well with effectively. This paper examines the common inconsistency and instability problems in SPH method and studies its computational efficiency when applied to hydrodynamics problems with material strength like soil column collapse. We analyzed in detail how the correction techniques mitigate these inconsistency and instability problems. Also, the numerical testing results associate with different values for the parameters used in the correction techniques are provided for better understanding the influence of these parameters and for finding out the desirable values. It is found that (1) the SPH method is easily subjected to an inconsistency problem in the boundary area due to the boundary deficiency, and it can be treated well by adopting “virtual particles” contributing to the particle summations. (2) The numerical oscillation in SPH simulation can be mitigated effectively by artificial viscosity with the suggested parameter values. (3) The tension cracking treatment, artificial viscosity and artificial stress work well in removing the tensile instability problem in SPH method. In addition, the nearest neighboring particle searching (NNPS) algorithm, spacing ratio, smoothing length and time step influence the efficiency and accuracy of SPH method significantly. It is shown that SPH method with suggested parameters values can produce a very good result compared with the experimental result.     

A simple method to describe three-dimensional anisotropic failure of soils

In order to describe the anisotropic failure of soils caused by the internal fabric, isotropic failure criterion should be generalized to be anisotropic. This paper achieves the generalization by introducing a simple method, called anisotropic transformed stress method, which apparently differs from the common way. Physical interpretation of this method are analyzed further. Using this method, many existing isotropic criteria can become anisotropic in the same way, and will be expressed by a unified formula finally. To verify this method, anisotropic Unified Strength Criterion is used to predict the peak strength of anisotropic soils in different loading conditions.     

磨刀门河口洪季波生流及其泄洪影响

磨刀门已由"径流型"向"径流-波浪型"河口转变,波浪已是该河口主要动力之一,但波浪对河口洪季水流及泄洪的影响缺少研究。在2-D潮流数学模型中添加随潮位实时变化的波浪辐射应力,建立波浪潮流耦合数学模型;波浪求解采用缓坡方程,背景水深由潮流模型实时提供,可通过比较考虑和未考虑波浪影响的河口流场来分析波浪对泄洪的影响。在年均常浪作用下,磨刀门河口洪季涨落潮阶段均有明显的波生环流结构。由于波浪作用方向向陆,波生流减弱了浅滩区的向海余流,增大了浅滩向陆余流;受浅滩向海余流减弱影响,河口动力自调整后形成归槽水流,促使深槽内向海余流增大。波浪有顶托河口泄洪之势,可改变滩槽泄洪分配比例;年均常浪的波高较小,其对潮流及泄洪的影响区域限制在浅水区,故对泄洪的负面影响有限。     

数值模拟探讨青藏高原东部应力应变场及断裂活动性

青藏高原东部是我国活动构造非常强烈的区域,现今的应力应变状态对活动构造研究有重要参考意义。本文依据地质资料和岩石力学性质构建相应的有限元数值模型,以GPS观测为边界约束,计算得到了青藏高原东部应力应变场,在此基础上探讨了主要断裂的活动特征。结果显示,距离印度板块和欧亚大陆板块碰撞带较近的青藏高原,汇聚速度、最大压应变率和最大压应力均较高,而随着远离碰撞带各个数值相应降低;在青藏高原东部,以喜马拉雅东构造结为旋转中心的一系列弧形断裂滑动速率相对较高,如玉树—鲜水河—小江断裂带,巴塘—金沙江断裂带,嘉黎断裂带等,这些走滑断裂带控制着青藏高原东南缘物质旋转挤出的特征,而其它断裂带滑动速率则相对较低,在块体内部则更低;结果同时表明应变速率分配高的断裂达到屈服的时间短,对应的地震复发周期短。     

库水载荷对水库触发地震的机制研究

利用有限元方法,研究库水载荷产生的应力场及其在断层面上引起的静态库仑破裂应力变化。通过计算发现,库水载荷的加载位置对地震的触发作用有重要的影响:当库水加载于断层正上方或断层上盘时,对正断层型的地震有促进作用,对逆断层型的地震有抑制作用。但是,当库水载荷作用于断层的下盘时,对于倾角较大的正断层与逆断层地震,库水都起抑制作用;而对倾角很小的断层起促进作用,但不会产生很强的水库地震。