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Classical soil mechanics involves the study of fully saturated soils. However, many problems encountered in geotechnical engineering practice involve unsaturated soil, in which behavior is significantly different from classical saturated soil. Negative pore pressure and capillary forces develop a virtual cohesion between the grains of semi saturated soils. This kind of cohesion is dependent on different factors such as grain size, saturation degree, soil-water characteristic curve and relative density of the soil. In this research the virtual cohesion of fine silty sand with 5% water content and a saturation degree of 17% is estimated. A vertical slope is constructed and is accelerated in the geotechnical centrifuge until failure. During the test, the model was monitored by a wireless video camera, attached to the strong box. The cohesionless tested sand was unsaturated. Based on the scaling laws and considering parameters such as sample unit weight, failure acceleration and the sample dimensions, a slope stability analysis was performed, and the virtual cohesion generated in the sample was calculated. The factor of safety of the prototype modeled in the centrifuge is calculated either by Finite Element Method and Finite Difference Method by using the resulted virtual cohesion from physical modeling. Results of this research show the validity of physical modeling for calculating the virtual cohesion in unsaturated silty sand.

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Although some 3D slope stability algorithms have been proposed in recent three decades, still role of pore pressures in three dimensional slope stability analyses and considering the effects of pore water pressure in 3D slope stability studies needs to be investigated. In this paper, a limit analysis formulation for investigation of role of the pore water pressure in three dimensional slope stability problems is presented. A rigid-block translational collapse mechanism is used, with energy dissipation taking place along planar velocity discontinuities. Results are compared with those obtained by others. It was found that water pressure causes the three-dimensional effects to be more significant, especially in gentle slopes. This may be related to the larger volume of the failure mass in gentle slopes resulting in more end effects. Dimensionless stability factors for three dimensional slope stability analyses are presented - including the 3D effect of the pore water pressure – for different values of the slope angle in cohesive and noncohesive soils.

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Laboratory data, which relate the liquefaction resistance of Firoozkooh sand and non-plastic silt mixtures to shear wave velocity are

presented and compared to liquefaction criteria derived from seismic field measurements by Andrus and Stokoe [1]. In the work

described herein, cyclic triaxial and resonant column tests were conducted on specimens of clean sand and sand-silt mixtures with silt

content up to 60%, prepared at different densities. Cyclic undrained strength and small strain shear wave velocity were determined

for identical specimens formed by undercompaction method. It was found that silt content affects cyclic resistance and shear wave

velocity. In addition, the laboratory results indicated that using the existing field-based correlations will overestimate the cyclic

resistance of the Firoozkooh sand-silt mixtures when silt content is 60%. For clean sand and the specimens containing up to 30% fines,

results of this study on cyclic resistance are fairly consistent with Andrus and Stokoe correlations. These findings suggest the need for

further evaluation of the effects of non-plastic fines content upon liquefaction criteria derived from seismic field measurements.

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In this paper, the effect of bedrock inclination on seismic performance of slopes is investigated. The study was conducted based

on dynamic analysis of different slopes, evaluation of the earthquake acceleration in sliding mass, and calculating the

permanent displacement of the slope, using Newmark sliding block. The investigation indicates that variation of the bedrock

inclination may cause the acceleration magnitude and the displacement in the sliding mass to reach to their maximum level.

This may happen in conditions that the mean period of the acceleration time history on failure surface (Tmt) and the

predominant period of the slope (Ts ) are close to each other. Typical results are presented and discussed. A two dimensional

model of a typical slope was considered and conducting dynamic analyses, the slope performance was studied for different

geometries, strength parameters and shear wave velocities. Such a performance has been studied by assessing the record of

acceleration in sliding mass (the mass above the critical sliding surface) and calculating the slope displacement using Newmark

method. It is shown that neglecting the effect of bedrock inclination, would lead to non-real results in assessing the seismic slope

performance.

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Presented is a method of three-dimensional stability analysis of convex slopes in plan view based on the Lower-bound theorem of
the limit analysis approach. The method’s aim is to determine the factor of safety of such slopes using numerical linear finite
element and lower bound limit analysis method to produce some stability charts for three dimensional (3D) homogeneous convex
slopes. Although the conventional two and three dimension limit equilibrium method (LEM) is used more often in practice for
evaluating slope stability, the accuracy of the method is often questioned due to the underlying assumptions that it makes. The
rigorous limit analysis results in this paper together with results of other researchers were found to bracket the slope stability
number to within ±10% or better and therefore can be used to benchmark for solutions from other methods. It was found that using
a two dimensional (2D) analysis to analyze a 3D problem will leads to a significant difference in the factors of safety depending
on the slope geometries. Numerical 3D results of proposed algorithm are presented in the form of some dimensionless graphs which
can be a convenient tool to be used by practicing engineers to estimate the initial stability for excavated or man-made slopes

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Seismic stability of slopes is typically evaluated by conventional methods under the assumption that the slope is subjected to an

earthquake just for one time. In general, time histories of loadings on slopes are unknown and loads are of variable repeated

nature. Shakedown phenomenon can be considered as a safe state for slopes subjected to variable repeated loadings. In this study,

lower bound dynamic shakedown theorem is employed for the seismic stability of slopes as a comprehensive verification. A

numerical method applied previously to evaluate roads under the traffic loads was modified to make it appropriate for dynamic

shakedown analysis in the present study. The numerical method is based on the combination of finite element and linear

programming methods. Critical PGA is employed as a comparative parameter to compare shakedown and pseudostatic methods.

Results show that, unlike pseudostaic method, shakedown approach is able to consider dynamic properties of load and slope.

Also, it is indicated that contrary to pseudostaic approach, shakedown solutions are different for slopes and embankments.

Shakedown and pseudostaic critical PGA versus dynamic properties of load and slope creates four distinct zones. It is shown that

the forgoing zones can be used as appropriate tools for seismic zonation of slopes based on their short term and long term safety

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Presented is a method of two-dimensional analysis of the active earth pressure due to simultaneous effect of both soil weight and surcharge of strip foundation. The study’s aim is to provide a rigorous solution to the problem in the framework of upper-bound theorem of limit analysis method in order to produce some design charts for calculating the lateral active earth pressure of backfill when loaded by a strip foundation. A kinematically admissible collapse mechanism consisting of several rigid blocks with translational movement is considered in which energy dissipation takes place along planar velocity discontinuities. Comparing the lateral earth forces given by the present analysis with those of other researchers, it is shown that the results of present analysis are higher (better) than other researchers’ results. It was found that with the increase in , the proportion of the strip load (q) which is transmitted to the wall decreases. Moreover, Increasing the friction between soil and wall ( ) will result in the increase of effective distance ( ). Finally, these results are presented in the form of dimensionless design charts relating the mechanical characteristics of the soil, strip load conditions and active earth pressure.

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The main purpose of this study is to investigate the influence of urban solid waste leachate on the mechanical properties of the soil. Order to provide a more accurate identification of the contaminated soils, Cylindrical specimens of the soil, according to the density curves with different initial conditions (different initial contamination levels) were prepared, then the soil specimens were loaded at different load levels using a direct shear testing equipment and a universal testing machine to apply axial compression on the specimens. By analyzing the results, the stress-strain and failure behavior of the soil specimens containing different percentages of the solid waste leachate was evaluated. The most important result was reducing the mechanical properties of the soil contaminated with different percentages of solid waste. The results of adding lower quantities of leachate, is far more significant compared to the received results from adding higher amounts of leachate.