Details of Grant 

EPSRC Reference:	GR/L17085/01
Title:	CONSTITUTIVE MODEL FOR DESTRUCTURATION OF NATURAL CLAY
Principal Investigator:	Muir Wood, Professor D
Other Investigators:	Lings, Dr ML Nash, Mr D
Researcher Co-Investigators:
Project Partners:
Department:	Civil Engineering
Organisation:	University of Bristol
Scheme:	Standard Research (Pre-FEC)
Starts:	01 October 1996	Ends:	30 June 2000	Value (£):	98,795
EPSRC Research Topic Classifications:	Ground Engineering
EPSRC Industrial Sector Classifications:
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Panel History:
Summary on Grant Application Form
Analysis of the behaviour of geotechnical structures requires the availability of appropriate constitutive models. Traditional single yield locus elastic-plastic models cannot readily describe either the small strain response or the destructuration (loss of structure) that occurs with deformation of natural clays. However, kinematic hardening models can reproduce the stiffness variation seen at small strains in all soils and a pilot simple kinematic hardening model has now been developed in which structure is introduced as a purely scalar quantity which is progressively lost as plastic straining occurs. This model reproduces qualitatively the strain softening and pseudo-yield loci that have often been reported for natural clays. This model will be extensively tested in its present form and then extended to incorporate a more realistic combined scalar and tensor measure of structure which, it is already recognised, is required to better match the observed plasticity and history dependence of natural clays. The model will be compared with data from low sensitivity clay from Bothkennar and other UK sites and with data from higher sensitivity Scandinavian and Canadian clays. The model will finally be developed for general stresses in a form which can be used in finite element analyses.
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Organisation Website:	http://www.bris.ac.uk