Research Expertise

The staff of the Geotechnical Research Centre has several decades of experience in solving soil and rock related problems in civil, geotechnical and geoenvironmental Engineering.

The major areas of expertise covered by Centre personnel include but are not limited to the following:

• Theoretical and applied soil and rock mechanics.
• Underground structures and soft ground tunnelling.
• Dynamic soil-structure interaction.
• In situ soil testing techniques and interpretation.
• Mineralogical/geochemical/environmental/clay-leachate compatibility.
• Contaminant transport through soil/waste disposal.
• Mathematical/computer modelling.
• Stability of concrete dams on rock foundations.
• Performance and rehabilitation of embankment dams.
• Tunnelling in swelling rock and through fault zones.
• Theory and applied electrokinetics in geomedia including offshore marine sediments.
• Physical, chemical and electrical behaviour of soil-water-electrolyte systems.
• Offshore structures.
• Environmental management of mine waste.
• Unsaturated soils.
• Deep geological disposal of high level radioactive nuclear waste.
• Behaviour of subaqueous cohesive tailings and sediments.
• Design and performance evaluation of engineered soil barriers.
• Groundwater contamination and remediation.
• Multiphase flow.

Specific Project Examples

• Over 200 mineralogy/soil chemistry contracts applied to clay barrier technology, soil and rock slope stability, dam design, aggregate technology, etc.
• Rock squeeze and related tunnel and shaft design and construction problems in major projects.
• Hydraulic conductivity of clay permeated with organic liquids and domestic and industrial leachate (clay/leachate compatibility).
• Field studies of pollutant migration by diffusion; heavy metal adsorption/ precipitation.
• Laboratory determination of diffusion/sorption parameters for both dissolved species and gaseous oxygen.
• Impact of freeze-thaw on soil cover properties.
• Response of piles and footings to dynamic loadings.
• Dynamics of machine foundations.
• Seismic response of buried pipelines.
• Tunnel design for energy and transportation.
• Safety assessment and rehabilitation of existing tunnels.
• Evaluation of shear strength parameters at concrete rock contact and stability analysis of concrete dams on rock foundations.
• Soil-structure interaction due to seismic loading and wave forces.
• Stress-strain-time relationship of rocks under general stress system.
• Investigation of effects of stress gradient and temperature on hydraulic conductivity of rocks.
• Static and dynamic analysis of pile groups.
• Electrical strengthening of clays.
• Soft ground tunnelling.
• In situ rock stress measurement in 15 major projects.
• Thermo-mechanical properties of rocks.
• Offshore piling.
• Seismic response of dams.
• Nonlinear soil-structure interaction.
• Electrokinetic dewatering consolidation of mine tailings.
• Electrokinetic desalinization of dredged materials.
• High-voltage electrokinetic strengthening of marine sediments.
• Impact of waste mixture composition on the migration and remediation of nonaqueous liquids.
• Development of hot water flooding for enhanced and cost effective remediation of nonaqueous liquids.
• Investigation of the utility of nanoparticles for the remediation of subsurface chlorinated solvents.
• Development of multiphase flow numerical simulators for improved prediction of subsurface multiphase flow.

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