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How contact stiffness and density determine stress-dependent elastic moduli: a micromechanics approach

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Abstract

To investigate the origin of the stress-level dependency of soil elasticity, a series of stress-path experiments were simulated for loose and dense soil specimens with three different contact surfaces. In the discrete element analyses, an assumption was introduced in which the contact body had the geometry of an elastic sphere with local, axi-symmetric irregularity. To evaluate the cross-anisotropic elastic shear moduli, small-strain cyclic shear tests were simulated under stress conditions along four stress-probing paths. For dense specimens with high coordination numbers, the internal structure was represented by the degree of fabric anisotropy and the coordination number remained unchanged during shearing, thus leading to the coincidence of the sum of the exponents in the contact stiffness model. For the loose specimens with low coordination numbers, the fabric structure evolved continuously during shearing, which resulted in the increase of the exponents in the power function of the elastic modulus. The rearrangement of particles and the transition of contact-force chains, along with the evolution of the fabric, manifested as increasing dependency of the elastic moduli on the stresses in such loose specimens.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) grant funded by the Korea government (MEST) (No. 2012R1A1B4002488) and Research Institute of Construction and Environmental Engineering at Seoul National University.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Seoul National University, Kwanak-gu, Seoul, 151-744, Republic of Korea

    Choong-Ki Chung & Sung-Ha Baek

  2. Civil and Environmental Engineering and Design Group, Hyungdai Engineering and Construction Co., Ltd, Seoul, 110-920, Republic of Korea

    Eui-Ryong Jang

  3. Department of Civil Engineering, College of Engineering, Kyung Hee University, 1732 Deogyeong-daero, Giheung-Gu, Yongin-Si, Gyeonggi-Do, 446-401, Republic of Korea

    Young-Hoon Jung

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  1. Choong-Ki Chung
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  2. Eui-Ryong Jang
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Correspondence to Young-Hoon Jung.

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Chung, CK., Jang, ER., Baek, SH. et al. How contact stiffness and density determine stress-dependent elastic moduli: a micromechanics approach. Granular Matter 16, 23–39 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10035-013-0456-2

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