Review
Version 1
Preserved in Portico This version is not peer-reviewed
A State of the Art: Numerical Methods to Simulate Desiccation Cracks in Clayey Soils
Version 1
: Received: 7 June 2023 / Approved: 8 June 2023 / Online: 8 June 2023 (10:20:07 CEST)
A peer-reviewed article of this Preprint also exists.
Levatti, H.U. Review of Methods to Solve Desiccation Cracks in Clayey Soils. Geotechnics 2023, 3, 808-828. Levatti, H.U. Review of Methods to Solve Desiccation Cracks in Clayey Soils. Geotechnics 2023, 3, 808-828.
Abstract
This paper reviews numerical methods used to simulate desiccation cracks in clayey soils. It examines five numerical approaches: Finite Element (FEM), Lattice Boltzmann (LBM), Discrete Element (DEM), Cellular Automaton (CAM), and Phase Field (PFM) Methods. The FEM is widely used to capture moisture diffusion, shrinkage, and cracking during drying. LBM is used to simulate fluid flow in clayey soils, while the DEM focuses on capturing the behavior of individual particles and their interactions. CAM simplifies crack evolution with computational efficiency, while PFM provides a continuous representation of crack formation and propagation. The author discusses the complexity of the problem, the continuum mechanics governing and constitutive equations that describe it, and the influence of various factors such as the multiphase nature of soils, heterogeneity, nonlinearities, coupling, scales of analysis, and computational aspects. The review highlights the characteristics, strengths, and limitations of each method. It emphasizes the importance of appropriate method selection for every problem depending on the aim of the analysis. The article concludes by reviewing the integration of multiple numerical methods to enhance the simulation of desiccation cracks in clayey soils.
Keywords
desiccation cracks in clayey soils; finite element method; lattice Boltzmann method; discrete element method; cellular automaton method; phase field method
Subject
Engineering, Civil Engineering
Copyright: This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
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