Influences of freezing-thawing actions on mechanical properties of soils and stress and deformation of soil slope in cold regions

Bo Xiang; Enlong Liu; Liuxin Yang

doi:10.1038/s41598-022-09379-3

Influences of freezing-thawing actions on mechanical properties of soils and stress and deformation of soil slope in cold regions

Sci Rep. 2022 Mar 30;12(1):5387. doi: 10.1038/s41598-022-09379-3.

Authors

Bo Xiang¹, Enlong Liu^{2

3}, Liuxin Yang⁴

Affiliations

¹ Sichuan Provincial Transport Department Highway Planning, Survey, Design and Research Institute, Chengdu, 610041, Sichuan, China.
² State Key Laboratory of Hydraulics and Mountain River Engineering, College of Water Resources and Hydropower, Sichuan University, Chengdu, 610065, China. liuenlong@scu.edu.cn.
³ State Key Laboratory of Frozen Soil Engineering, Northwest Institute of Eco-Environment and Resources, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Lanzhou, 730000, China. liuenlong@scu.edu.cn.
⁴ State Key Laboratory of Hydraulics and Mountain River Engineering, College of Water Resources and Hydropower, Sichuan University, Chengdu, 610065, China.

Abstract

Freezing-thawing actions can affect the mechanical features of soil greatly, which is vital for the stability of soil slope in cold regions. Firstly, triaxial compression tests on sand samples under undrained conditions were performed to investigate the influences of freezing-thawing cycles, which shows that the freezing-thawing actions can weaken their strength and stiffness, and with the increasing freezing-thawing cycles, both the deviatoric stress and pore water pressure decrease gradually. Then, the double hardening constitutive model was revised to model the influences of freezing-thawing cycles in consideration of the influences of freezing-thawing actions, and the model was also validated by the test results. Finally, the proposed constitutive model was incorporated into a finite element code to numerically simulate the distribution of displacement and pore water pressure of sand slope subjected to freezing-thawing cycles, which shows that the freezing-thawing actions accelerate the dissipation of the pore water pressure and enlarge the displacement of the slope. The study here can provide a help in designing and construction of civil engineering in cold regions.