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Soils and Foundations xxx (2018) xxx–xxx
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Modeling the static liquefaction of unsaturated sand

containing gas bubbles
Xilin Lü a,b,c,⇑, Maosong Huang a,b, José E. Andrade c
a
Department of Geotechnical Engineering, Tongji University, Shanghai 200092, China
b
Key Laboratory of Geotechnical and Underground Engineering of Ministry of Education, Tongji University, Shanghai 200092, China
c
Department of Mechanical and Civil Engineering, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA 91106, USA

Received 15 December 2016; received in revised form 8 October 2017; accepted 18 October 2017

Abstract

As a modification of the deviatoric hardening plasticity model, a material state-dependent model was proposed to simulate the
response of unsaturated sand containing gas bubbles under undrained triaxial conditions. Affected by the compressibility of gas, the
stress paths under undrained conditions approach the drained response of sand when the initial degree of saturation is low. Upon an
increase in the degree of saturation, the stress path gradually approaches the saturated undrained response. According to the prediction
based on the second-order work criterion, static liquefaction occurs in loose sand, but not in dense sand. Increases in the degree of sat-
uration and the initial gas pressure reduce the stress ratio at the instability points. The instability line obtained by connecting those insta-
bility points in the p-q space is nonlinear, and its slope depends on the initial void ratio, the initial degree of saturation, the initial gas
pressure, and the confining stress. After comparing the experimental results in the literature with the theoretical prediction, the proposed
model was shown to precisely predict the onset of the static liquefaction of unsaturated sand containing gas bubbles.
Ó 2018 Production and hosting by Elsevier B.V. on behalf of The Japanese Geotechnical Society. This is an open access article under the CC BY-
NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).

Keywords: Static liquefaction; Unsaturated sand; Gas pressure; Material state; Second-order work criterion

1. Introduction neering properties of soil (Grozic et al., 1999).

Due to biogenic or petrogenic processes (Floodgate and
Judd, 1992), oceanic soil often contains a large amount of
dissolved gases, (e.g., carbon dioxide, hydrogen sulfide,
ethane, and methane). The dissociation of the gas pushes
against the soil skeleton and creates gas-filled voids. In
unsaturated soil, the gas often exists in discrete bubble
form, while in fully saturated soil, it is entrapped
(Pietruszczak and Pande, 1996). Due to the high compress-
ibility of gas, the existence of gas bubbles affects the engi-
Peer review under responsibility of The Japanese Geotechnical Society.
⇑ Corresponding author at: Department of Geotechnical Engineering,
Tongji University, Shanghai 200092, China.
E-mail address: xilinlu@tongji.edu.cn (X. Lü).
Furthermore, the dissociation of methane hydrates
decreases the effective stress as well as the shear strength
of soil (Xu and Germanovich, 2006; Wu and Grozic, 2008).
The mechanical behavior of soil can be significantly
affected by the presence of free gas (Christian and
Cranston, 1997; Fourie et al., 2001; Amaratunga and
Grozic, 2009). The responses of unsaturated soil containing
discrete gas bubbles in undrained and drained triaxial tests
were bounded by the saturated drained and undrained
responses (Vega-Posada et al., 2014). The shear strength
of dense sand is reduced by the presence of free gas, and
the mobilized shear strength depends on the type of gas,
the amount of gas, and the magnitude of the pore-water
pressure (Rad et al., 1994). To describe the constitutive
behavior of unsaturated soil, a suitable description of

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sandf.2017.11.008
0038-0806/Ó 2018 Production and hosting by Elsevier B.V. on behalf of The Japanese Geotechnical Society.
This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).

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doi.org/10.1016/j.sandf.2017.11.008
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Nomenclature

A material parameter pat atmospheric pressure

Ad material parameter of stress-dilatancy Q plastic potential function
B Biot’s coefficient q equivalent shear stress
Bg, Bw strain concentration parameters R radius of gas bubble
Deijkl ; De elasto-plastic modulus tensors Sa liquid/gas degree of saturation
Ss internal solid surface area
Dpijkl ; Dp plastic modulus tensors
sij effective deviatoric stress
Dep
ijkl ; D
ep
elasto-plastic modulus tensors Sr degree of saturation
(Dep)sys symmetric part of elasto-plastic modulus tensor Sr0 degree of saturation at initial state
T surface tension force
d2w second-order work
Tn normal component of surface tension force
dr0 effective stress increment
ug excess gas pressure above the atmospheric
de strain increment
pressure
E elastic modulus
ug0 initial value of excess gas pressure
e void ratio
ugw average pore fluid pressure in voids
e0 initial void ratio
uw pore water pressure
ec void ratio at critical state
Va volume of free gas
eij deviatoric strain
Vd volume of dissolved gas
F yield function
Vs volume of soil particle
G pressure-dependent shear modulus
Vw volume of water
G0 shear modulus constant
Vg volume of gas
Hp hardening modulus
Vv volume of void
h Henry’s constant
b influence factor on surface tension
J2 second stress invariant
dij Kronecker’s delta
J3 third stress invariant
ea axial strain
K bulk elastic modulus

er radial strain
K elastic bulk modulus of solid matrix
u friction angle
Kg bulk modulus of gas
r0a axial effective stress
Ks intrinsic bulk modulus
rc initial confining stress
Kw water bulk modulus
rij stress tensor
L total perimeter of air-water menisci
eij strain tensor
M stress ratio
eps equivalent plastic shear strain
Mcs stress ratio at critical state
ev volumetric strain
Md dilatancy stress ratio
k_ plastic multiplier
Mf peak stress ratio
kc material parameter determining critical state
Mis stress ratio at onset of static liquefaction
line
n soil porosity
v Poisson’s ratio
nb peak stress ratio parameter
W material state parameter
nd dilatancy parameter
hr Lode angle
p mean stress
pa liquid/gas pressure

effective stress must be proposed. In multi-phase porous
media, the effective stress can be obtained by the contin-
uum principle of thermodynamics (Borja and Koliji,
2009). Wheeler (1988) proposed a conceptual model, which
consists of a matrix of saturated soil surrounding isolated
gas-filled cavities, to calibrate the behavior of unsaturated
soil containing large gas bubbles. Taking into account the
compressibility and solubility of pore gas and liquids,
Grozic et al. (2005) proposed a constitutive model for gassy
sand (identical to unsaturated soil containing discrete gas
bubbles) based on an existing model. However, this model
cannot predict slight increases in the effective mean normal
stress observed at the initial stage of undrained triaxial
tests. Sultan and Garziglia (2014) presented a constitutive
model for gassy soil based on the Cam-Clay model.
Static liquefaction is typical instability found in loose
granular materials. It has been studied experimentally
(Lade and Pradel, 1990; Doanh et al., 1997; Chu and
Wanatowski, 2008; Wei and Yang, 2014), theoretically
(Borja, 2006; Andrade, 2009; Buscarnera and Whittle,
2013; Lu et al., 2014; Sadrekarimi, 2014; Lu and Huang,
2015), and numerically (Mohammadnejad and Andrade,

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 X. Lü et al. / Soils and Foundations xxx (2018) xxx–xxx 3
X
2015) under the completely saturated case. The influence of r0ij ¼ rij  BS a pa dij ð1Þ
many factors, e.g., the density of sand (Yang, 2002; a¼l;g
Andrade, 2009), the particle size characteristics (Rahman
where r0ij and rij are the effective and total stresses,
and Lo, 2012), the consolidation state (Fourie and
B ¼ 1  K=K
s is the Biot’s coefficient, K
is the elastic bulk
Tshabalala, 2005), the loading mode (Chu and
Wanatowski, 2009), the drainage condition (Chu et al., modulus of the solid matrix, K s is the intrinsic bulk modu-
2012; Chu et al., 2015; Mital and Andrade, 2016, Lü lus, S a is the liquid/gas saturation, pa is the liquid/gas pres-
et al., 2017a,b), the initial anisotropy (Lü et al., 2017a,b), sure, and dij is Kronecker’s delta. When the degree of
and the initial degree of saturation of the specimen saturation is high enough, the liquid phase is continuous
(Buscarnera and Nova, 2011; He et al., 2014), have been and gas exists in the form of bubbles embedded in the liq-
studied recently. Compared with the results of undrained uid phase. The effective stress of unsaturated sand, in which
tests on fully saturated sand, the existence of gas makes the solid and the liquid are assumed to be incompressible,
the unsaturated sand more compressible and restricts the can be formulated as
buildup of excess pore-water pressure (Vega-Posada r0ij ¼ rij  ugw dij ð2Þ
et al., 2014). Monotonic consolidated undrained triaxial
compression tests have shown that loose unsaturated sand where ugw is the average pore fluid pressure in the voids.
produces static liquefaction if the initial degree of satura- Eq. (2) follows the Terzaghi’s effective stress principle
tion is larger than a predetermined cut-off value (Grozic which is widely used in saturated soil.
et al., 1999). A decrease in saturation leads to an increase Considering a representative volume V of an unsatu-
in the slope of the instability line, which then causes an rated soil containing gas bubbles, the following equation
improvement in the shear strength and the liquefaction is obtained:
resistance of the sand. By using the plasticity model for V ¼VsþVwþVg ¼VsþVv ð3Þ
unsaturated soil (Pietruszczak and Pande, 1996), the lique-
faction potential of unsaturated sand subjected to an earth- where Vs is the volume of soil particles, Vw is the volume of
quake was investigated (Pietruszczak et al., 2003). The water, Vg is the volume of gas, and Vv is the volume of
second-work criterion, which is suitable for unsaturated voids. A typical representation of unsaturated sand is
soil (Buscarnera and di Prisco, 2011; Buscarnera and di shown in Fig. 1.
Prisco, 2012) and quasi-saturated soil (Mihalache and According to the definition by Pietruszczak and Pande
Buscarnera, 2016), was proposed, and the controllability (1996), ugw can be obtained by
criteria were investigated to understand the soil failure Z Z Z Z LZ
under specific testing conditions (Mihalache and ugw dV v ¼ uw dV w þ ug dV g  T n dldz ð4Þ
Buscarnera, 2016). Vv Vw Vg 0 Vg

In this paper, a material state-dependent constitutive where uw is the water pressure and ug is the excess gas
model for unsaturated sand containing gas bubbles was pressure above the atmospheric pressure. Tn is the normal
proposed by modifying an existing deviatoric hardening component of surface tension force T (per unit length of
model (Pietruszczak and Stolle, 1987; Wood and Liu, the air-water meniscus) and L is the total perimeter of
1994; Pietruszczak, 2010), and then the static liquefaction the air-water menisci.
instability was predicted. The contents of this paper are Considering a single air bubble in a spherical form sur-
organized as follows: the second part proposes a material rounded by liquid,
state-dependent constitutive model and formulates the Z LZ Z R
stress-strain relationship under undrained triaxial condi- 4p 8pR2
T n dldz ¼ T ðR2  z2 Þdz ¼ T ð5Þ
tions, the third part presents the criterion for predicting 0 Vg R 0 3
static liquefaction, the fourth part validates the model for
predicting static liquefaction instability using existing where R is the radius of the bubble.
experimental data, and the fifth part is an analysis of the
factors that influence static liquefaction.

Gas Vg
2. Constitutive modeling of unsaturated sand
Water Vw
2.1. Definition of effective stress
Solid Vs
In the undrained case, any applied total stress on sand
containing gas bubbles is undertaken by the soil skeleton,
pore gas, and pore liquid. According to the mixture theory,
(a) Representative soil element (b) Volume of each phase
the effective stress of multi-phase porous media is as fol-
lows (Borja and Koliji, 2009): Fig. 1. Illustration of unsaturated soil containing gas bubbles.

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The average pressure in the voids can be expressed as where K
is the average bulk modulus of the mixture and n
follows (Pietruszczak and Pande, 1996): is the porosity.
pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi For simplicity, when u_ gw ¼ u_ w ,
2 Ss 1  Sr
ugw ¼ S r uw þ ð1  S r Þug  T ð6Þ

3 Vv K
¼ Bw K w ð15Þ
where Sr is the degree of saturation and Ss is the internal n
solid surface area. Then,
If the surface tension force is ignored, Eq. (6) is the same Kw

¼
K ð16Þ
as Bishop’s effective stress, as follows: S r þ ð1  S r Þ KKwg
r0ij ¼ rij  ug dij þ vðug  uw Þdij ð7Þ
Furthermore, if the change in surface tension T during
where v is a parameter related to the degree of saturation. the loading process is ignored, u_ g ¼ u_ w , and if the solubility
For simplicity, v ¼ S r can be assumed. is very small, then the stiffness of the mixture of gas and
water becomes
2.2. Change in fluid pressure under undrained loading 1

¼
K ð17Þ
Sr
þ u1S
g þp
r
The calculation of the fluid pressure plays a key role in Kw at

the simulation of the stress-strain behavior of unsaturated Since 1

is much smaller than 1S r
;
Kw ug þpat
sand. According to Henry’s law (Pietruszczak and Pande,
1996),
¼ ug þ pat
K ð18Þ
1  Sr
ðV a þ V d Þðug þ pat Þ ¼ const ð8Þ
Finally, the change in pore fluid pressure is
where Va and Vd are the volumes of free and dissolved
gases, respectively, and pat = 101.3 kPa is the atmospheric ug þ pat
Dugw ¼ Dev ð19Þ
pressure. ð1  S r Þn
The change in gas pressure is Eq. (19) is identical to the definition given by Atigh and
u_ g ¼ K a e_ vg ¼ K g Bg e_ v ð9Þ Byrne (2004).
where Kg is the bulk modulus of the gas and Bg is a strain 2.3. Modified deviatoric hardening plasticity model
concentration parameter (Pietruszczak and Pande, 1991).
Kg is given by The proposition of a constitutive model for unsaturated
 
1  Sr sand is based on an existing deviatoric hardening plasticity
K g ¼ ðug þ pat Þ ð10Þ
1  S r þ hS r model (Pietruszczak and Stolle, 1987; Wood and Liu, 1994;
Pietruszczak, 2010; Huang et al., 2010). The adopted yield
where h is Henry’s constant, which denotes the coefficient function is
of solubility.
Bg can be obtained by F ¼ q  Mgðhr Þp0 ¼ 0 ð20Þ
Kw where the mean effective pressure is p0 ¼ rii =3  ugw , the
Bg ¼ h g K b
i ð11Þ pffiffiffiffiffiffiffi qffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
equivalent shear stress is q ¼ 3J 2 ¼ 3s0ij s0ij =2, the
n S r þ ð1  S r Þ KKwg
deviatoric stress is s0ij ¼ r0ij  dij p0 , dij is Kronecker’s delta,
where Kw is the bulk modulus of water, n is porosity, and
 pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi M is the stress ratio, gðhr Þ ¼ ð3  sin uÞ=ð3 þ sin uþ
pffiffiffi pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
b ¼ TS s S r = 3V v 1  S r is the influence factor on surface 2 sin u 1  sinð3hr ÞÞ is the shape function in the devia-
h pffiffiffi  i
tension.
toric plane, Lode angle hr ¼ sin1 3 3J 3 = 2J 2
3=2
=3,
The change in water pressure is pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
and J 3 ¼ sij sjk ski =3. Under triaxial conditions, gðhr Þ ¼ 1.
u_ w ¼ K w Bw e_ v ð12Þ
Previous results have indicated that the critical state
where Bw is a strain concentration parameter (Pietruszczak lines of the unsaturated soil tested at different levels of suc-
and Pande, 1991); it can be obtained by tion stress show parallel lines (Wheeler and Sivakumar,
1 1995; Rojas and Chávez, 2013). In the case of unsaturated
Bw ¼ h i ð13Þ sand containing gas bubbles, the critical state line of unsat-
n S r þ ð1  S r Þ KKwg urated sand can be defined by revising the critical state line
(Yang and Li, 2004):
The change in pore pressure of the mixture of gas and
water is ec ¼ ec0 þ ð1  S r0 Þ0:5 Dec0  kc logðpÞ ð21Þ
K
where ec0 , Dec0 , and kc are the material parameters deter-
u_ gw ¼ e_ v ð14Þ
n mining the critical state line in the e-log(p) plane.

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The bulk modulus and shear modulus are

8
< K ¼ 3ð12mÞ
2ð1þmÞ
G
qffiffiffiffi ð26Þ
: G ¼ G0 p ð2:97eÞ2 p0
at 1þe p at

The plastic hardening modulus is

Ap0 M f
Hp ¼ 2
ð27Þ
ðA þ eep Þ

The degree of saturation is

Fig. 2. Critical state lines for Ottawa sand. e0 S r0
Sr ¼ ð28Þ
e0  ð1 þ e0 Þev
The evolution of M follows the hyperbolic law
(Pietruszczak and Stolle, 1987; Wood and Liu, 1994): The porosity of sand is
eps e0  ð1 þ e0 Þev
M ¼ Mf ð22Þ n¼ ð29Þ
A þ eps ð1 þ e0 Þ  ð1 þ e0 Þev
where A is a material parameter which can be determined
by fitting the experimental data of the stress-strain curve.
The peak value of stress ratio Mf is (Manzari and 3. Criteria of static liquefaction
Dafalias, 1997)
M f ¼ M cs expðnb wÞ ð23Þ The second-order work criterion has been widely
adopted in predicting the potential unstable behavior of
where nb is the peak stress ratio parameter, w ¼ e  ec is soil. For specific testing conditions, this criterion should
the material state parameter (Been and Jefferies, 1985), be combined with controllability criteria to predict the
and ec is the void ratio at the critical state. occurrence of failure. When the soil is changed from satu-
The material state-dependent stress dilatancy function rated to unsaturated, the second-order work criterion and
(Wood and Liu, 1994) is controllability criteria will be different (Buscarnera and
depv Nova, 2011; Mihalache and Buscarnera, 2015).
¼ M d  M ¼ M cs expðnd wÞ  M ð24Þ In fully saturated soil, the second-order work criterion is
deps
where Md is the stress ratio corresponding to the transition d 2 w ¼ dr0 : de 6 0 ð30Þ
from contractive to dilative behavior, and nd is the stress-
dilatancy function parameter. where d 2 w is the second-order work, dr0 is the effective
The rate-form stress-strain relationship under triaxial stress increment obtained by Terzaghi’s principle of effec-
conditions is tive stress, and de is the corresponding strain increment.
0 In the case of fully saturated sand under undrained tri-
Dp ¼ KDeev ¼ KðDev  Depv Þ
ð25Þ axial conditions, the criterion for static liquefaction is
Dq ¼ 3GDees ¼ 3GðDes  Deps Þ (Buscarnera and di Prisco, 2011; Andrade et al., 2013)
where K is the bulk modulus and G is the shear modulus.
pq ð2; 2Þ ¼ 0
Dep ð31Þ

(a) Experiments (after He and Chu, 2015) (b) Simulations

Fig. 3. Stress-strain relationships.

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(a) Experiments (after He and Chu, 2015) (b) Simulations

Fig. 4. Stress paths.

(a) Experiments (after He and Chu, 2015) (b) Simulations

Fig. 5. Pore water pressure.

densities of air and water in unsaturated sand is much less

than 1, a simplified formulation of the second-order work
can be proposed (Mihalache and Buscarnera, 2016).
d 2 w  dr0 : de þ ndugw ðdS r =S r Þ 6 0 ð32Þ

where n is the porosity of soil and dugw is the increment in

pore-fluid pressure.

4. Validation by undrained triaxial experiments

Undrained triaxial tests on Ottawa sand at different ini-

Fig. 6. Evolution of second order work.
Eq. (31) is equivalent to the loss of controllability
criterion in fully saturated soil subjected to undrained
loading (Buscarnera and Whittle, 2013). However, the loss
of controllability criterion will show a significant difference
in unsaturated soil or quasi-saturated soil under water
undrained loading conditions (Mihalache and
Buscarnera, 2016). When discrete gas bubbles are occluded
in water, the fluid phase of unsaturated sand becomes com-
pressible, and this makes the second-order work criterion
different from Eq. (30). Since the ratio between the
tial degrees of saturation (He and Chu, 2014) were simu-
lated. The mean diameter of Ottawa sand is d50 = 0.38–
0.4 mm, the specific gravity is Gs = 2.67, the maximum
void ratio is emax = 0.8–0.82, and the minimum void ratio
is emin = 0.48–0.5. The determination of the model param-
eters is as follows. G0 is a regression constant that can be
identified by fitting the experimental data using Eq.
(26b); Poisson’s ratio m can be determined by Eq. (26a).
Parameters Mcs, kc, ec0, and n can be determined by the
experimental data on the stress ratio and the e-p curve at
the critical state. nb and nd can be determined by Eqs.
(23) and (24), respectively, from the measured data of w
and M at the phase transformation state and the peak
stress state; d0 can be determined by the ev-eq curve.

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(a) Shear strength (b) Stress ratio

Fig. 7. Relationship of degree of saturation and instability points.

(a) Stress path (b) Stress-strain

(c) Pore water pressure (d) Second-order work

(e) Instability points

Fig. 8. Influence of initial void ratio on instability of unsaturated sand (Sr0 = 0.95).

Material constant A can be determined by fitting the exper- = 3.5, ec0 = 0.81, Dec0 = 0.3, kc = 0.026, n = 0.3, and A
imental data of the stress-strain curve. The obtained model = 0.0018. The critical state line was obtained by referring
parameters are G0 = 50, m = 0.15, Mcs = 1.2, nb = 1.1, nd to the experiments on saturated sand (Omar and

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(a) Stress path (b) Stress-strain

(c) Pore water pressure (d) Second-order work

(e) Instability points

Fig. 9. Influence of initial saturation ratio on instability of unsaturated sand (e0 = 0.8).

Sadrekarimi, 2015) and fitting the experimental data of the
unsaturated sand (He and Chu, 2014); the results are
shown in Fig. 2.
The initial void ratios of the specimens were 0.774,
0.773, 0.773, 0.770, and 0.769, and the initial degrees of sat-
uration were 94.5%, 96.3%, 98.1%, 99.2%, and 100%. The
height and diameter of the specimens were 100 mm and
50 mm, respectively, and the confining pressure was 100
kPa. The test was simulated by a strain-controlled loading
process after the initial isotropic consolidation. The sand
specimen when Sr = 0 was also predicted, and the initial
void ratio was assumed to be 1.0 to capture the mechanical
behavior of loose sand. The predicted stress-strain relation-
ships are shown in Fig. 3(b); these results align well with
the experiments shown in Fig. 3(a). The predicted stress
paths are shown in Fig. 4(b). When the initial degree of sat-
uration is low, the stress path is close to that of a drained
triaxial test at the initial loading stage, and then it trans-
forms to a stress path of an undrained triaxial test. As
shown in Fig. 5, a higher initial degree of saturation corre-
lates to faster accumulation of water pressure in the pores.
The evolution of the second-order work is shown in Fig. 6.
The increase in the initial degree of saturation causes the
second-order work to rapidly fall below zero. The shear
stress and stress ratios of the instability points are shown
in Fig. 7; the predicted results align well with the experi-
mental results. Furthermore, the increase in the initial
degree of saturation causes a decrease in the peak shear

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(a) Stress path (b) Stress-strain

(c) Pore water pressure (d) Second-order work

(e) Instability points

Fig. 10. Influence of initial gas pressure on instability of unsaturated sand (Sr0 = 0.95, e0 = 0.8).

stress and stress ratio. If the initial value for the degree of
saturation is low enough, static liquefaction does not
occur.
5. Analysis of influence factors on static liquefaction
5.1. Initial void ratio
The predicted responses of sand specimens with initial
void ratio e0 = 0.7, 0.8, 0.9, and 1.0 are shown in Fig. 8
(a)–(c). The loose sand shows peak shear stress during
the strain-controlled loading, and the dense sand shows a
continuously increasing trend in shear stress. The contrac-
tive property of loose sand results in the increase in pore
pressure during shearing; the dilative property of dense
sand results in the transition of pore pressure from positive
values to negative values. The evolution of the second-
order work is shown in Fig. 8(d). Loose sand shows nega-
tive second-order work during the loading process. Mean-
while, the second-order work of dense sand remains
consistently positive. As shown in Fig. 8(e), the increase
in initial void ratio induces the increase in the stress ratio
at the instability point. Instability does not occur if the
sand is dense enough.
5.2. Initial degree of saturation
The undrained mechanical behavior of the unsaturated
sand with initial degrees of saturation of the specimens of
Sr0 = 0.85, 0.9, 0.95, and 1 were simulated. The predicted

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responses of the loose sand (e0 = 0.8) are shown in Fig. 9 and the main factors influencing the static liquefaction
(a–c). With the increase in the initial degree of saturation, were investigated.
the shear stress decreases. Accompanying the continuous The model was shown to be capable of considering the
increase in pore pressure, a peak in shear stress occurs. influences of the void ratio, the initial degree of saturation,
The evolutions of the second-order works of the specimens and the initial gas pressure on the response of unsaturated
with Sr0 = 0.85, 0.90, 0.95 and 1 are shown in Fig. 9(d). sand containing discrete gas bubbles under undrained load-
The increase in the initial saturation causes the second- ing conditions. Due to the compressibility of gas bubbles,
order work to fall rapidly below zero. Static liquefaction the decrease in the initial degree of saturation resulted in
can be triggered in a fully saturated state; however, if the higher compressibility of the sand and larger shear stress.
degree of saturation decreases, the static liquefaction The increase in the initial gas pressure resulted in lower
becomes difficult to trigger. The predicted critical stress compressibility of the gas and higher water pore pressure.
ratios at the instability points are shown in Fig. 9(e). With Static liquefaction is likely to occur in loose sand, but does
the increase in the initial degree of saturation, the critical not occur in dense sand. Increases in the degree of saturation
stress ratio at the instability point decreases. Low confining and the initial gas pressure reduce the stress ratio at the insta-
stress decreases the critical stress ratio, which implies a bility points. The liquefaction instability line of loose sand is
higher potential for a flow slide in the shallower area of a nonlinear in the p-q space; its slope depends on the initial
slope. void ratio, the initial degree of saturation, the initial gas pres-
sure, and the initial confining stress. High values for the ini-
tial void ratio, the initial degree of saturation, the initial gas
5.3. Initial gas pressure
pressure, and the low initial confining stress result in a small
stress ratio at the instability points.
The influence of the initial gas pressure on the unsatu-
rated sand containing discrete gas bubbles under undrained
triaxial compression conditions was further investigated. At Acknowledgments
the initial state of unsaturated sand, the gas pressure and
water pressure may not be equal for the existence of surface The financial support of the National Key Research and
tension force. This initial gas pressure can be attained in tri- Development Program (through Grant No.
axial tests by applying an initial back-pressure prior to test- 2016YFC0800202), the National Science Foundation of
ing. The changes in both pressures are assumed to be equal China (NSFC through Grant Nos. 41672270, 11372228),
during the testing procedure if the gas bubbles do not break, and the Shanghai Pujiang project (17PJD040) are grate-
and this reasonable assumption can simplify the problem. In fully acknowledged.
the simulation, the initial excess atmospheric air pressure
was taken to be 0 kPa, 50 kPa, 100 kPa, and 200 kPa. The Appendix A
results are shown in Fig. 10. As shown in Fig. 10(a–c), the
peak shear stress drops with the increase in ug0, and the soft- According to the consistency condition, the following
ening trend is enhanced. The stress path, shown in Fig. 10(a), equation is obtained:
changes from one similar to a drained condition to one sim- @F @F @F @M @eps
ilar to an undrained condition. The pore water pressure DF ¼ Dp0 þ Dq þ Dk ¼ 0 ðA-1Þ
@p 0 @q @M @eps @k
builds up with the increase in ug0; high gas pressure decreases
gas compressibility. The evolutions of the second-order Then, the following equation is obtained:
work of the specimens with ug0 = 0 kPa, 50 kPa, 100 kPa, @F @F
K @p 0 Dev þ 3G @q Des
and 200 kPa are shown in Fig. 10(d). The increase in initial Dk ¼ @F @F
ðA-2Þ
gas pressure induces the second-order work to rapidly fall H p þ KðM d  MÞ @p 0 þ 3G @q

below zero, indicating that instabilities are more likely to

Eq. (A-2) can be further formulated, as follows:
occur in large back-pressure saturated soil. The predicted
stress ratios at the instability points are shown in Fig. 10 KMDev þ 3GDes
Dk ¼ ðA-3Þ
(e); high gas pressure causes a low stress ratio at the instabil- H p þ KMðM  M d Þ þ 3G
ity points.
The rate form of the stress-strain relationship under the
triaxial condition is obtained:
6. Conclusions 0

p_ e_ v
¼ Dep ðA-4Þ
A material state-dependent deviatoric hardening plastic- q_ pq
e_ s
ity model was proposed to predict the onset of static lique- " K 2 MðM d MÞ 3KGðM d MÞ
#
K þ H p þKMðMM Þþ3G þKM ðMM Þþ3G
faction in unsaturated sand containing gas bubbles. It was where Dpq ¼
ep d H p d
9G2
.
assumed that the critical state line in the e-logp space was
3KGM
H p þKMðMM d Þþ3G
3G  H p þKMðMM d Þþ3G
related to the degree of saturation. The undrained behavior The rate form of the stress-strain relationship under the
of sand induced by the compressibility of gas was studied, triaxial condition is obtained:

Please cite this article in press as: Lü, X. et al., Modeling the static liquefaction of unsaturated sand containing gas bubbles, Soils Found. (2018), https://
doi.org/10.1016/j.sandf.2017.11.008
 X. Lü et al. / Soils and Foundations xxx (2018) xxx–xxx 11

ðDr0a  2Dugw Þ=3 Dea þ 2Der Chu, J., Wanatowski, D., Loke, W.L., Leong, W.K., 2015. Pre-failure
¼ Dep ðA-5Þ instability of sand under dilatancy rate controlled conditions. Soils
Dr0a þ Dugw 2ðDea  Der Þ=3 Found. 55 (2), 414–424.
where ea and er are the axial strain and the radial strain, Doanh, T., Ibraim, E., Matiotti, R., 1997. Undrained instability of very
loose Hostun sand in triaxial compression and extension. Part 1:
respectively, r0a is the axial effective stress, and rc is the ini- Experimental observations. Mech. Cohesive Friction. Mater. 2 (1), 47–
tial confining stress. 70.
Combining Eqs. (19) and (A-5), the following equation Floodgate, G.D., Judd, A.G., 1992. The origins of shallow gas. Cont.
is obtained: Shelf Res. 12 (10), 1145–1156.
0

Fourie, A.B., Hofmann, B.A., Mikula, R.J., Lord, E.R.F., Robertson, P.
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¼N ep
ðA-6Þ
Der A2 Dea Géotechnique 51 (7), 577–585.
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where role of K0 consolidation. Can. Geotech. J. 42 (3), 892–906.
2 4ðu þp Þ
31 Grozic, J.L., Robertson, P.K., Morgenstern, N.R., 1999. The behaviour of
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1
 3ð1S
g at
r Þn
 2K  H2KðKM
p þKM ðMM d Þþ3G
loose gassy sand. Can. Geotech. J. 36 (3), 482–492.
Nep ¼ 4 5
3
ðA-7Þ Grozic, J.L.H., Imam, S.M.R., Robertson, P.K., Morgenstern, N.R.,
2ðug þpat Þ
1 ð1S r Þn
þ 2G  H p þKMðMM
6GðKMþGÞ
d Þþ3G
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