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Variations of the temperatures and volumetric unfrozen water contents of fine-grained soils during a freezing–thawing process

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Abstract

In this study, the variations of the temperatures and volumetric unfrozen water contents for two fine-grained soils (i.e., silty clay and silt) with high degrees of saturation during a freezing–thawing process were experimentally studied. Experimental results show that for the two soils, the supercooling phenomenon only happens in the early stage of freezing process, and the supercooling temperature and its duration of the silty clay are both larger than those of the silt under similar temperatures; furthermore, the hysteresis effect of volumetric unfrozen water content exists during the whole freezing–thawing process, and the maximum hysteresis levels both occur at the soil freezing points; however, the maximum value of the hysteresis level of the silt is larger than that of the silty clay.

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Acknowledgements

This research was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 41471063), the National Key Research and Development Program of China (Grant No. 2018YFC0809605), the Program of the State Key Laboratory of Frozen Soil Engineering (Grant No. SKLFSE-ZT-23), the Key Research Program of Frontier Sciences of Chinese Academy of Sciences (Grant No. QYZDY-SSW-DQC015), and the Natural Science Foundation of Gansu Province of China (Grant No. 1508RJZA100).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. State Key Laboratory of Frozen Soil Engineering, Northwest Institute of Eco-Environment and Resources, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Lanzhou, 730000, China

    Mingyi Zhang, Xiyin Zhang, Yuanming Lai, Jianguo Lu & Chong Wang

  2. School of Civil Engineering, Lanzhou Jiaotong University, Lanzhou, 730070, China

    Xiyin Zhang

  3. School of Civil Engineering and Mechanics, Lanzhou University, Lanzhou, 730000, China

    Chong Wang

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  1. Mingyi Zhang
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  2. Xiyin Zhang
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  3. Yuanming Lai
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  4. Jianguo Lu
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  5. Chong Wang
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Correspondence to Mingyi Zhang.

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Zhang, M., Zhang, X., Lai, Y. et al. Variations of the temperatures and volumetric unfrozen water contents of fine-grained soils during a freezing–thawing process. Acta Geotech. 15, 595–601 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11440-018-0720-z

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11440-018-0720-z

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