The Development of Underground Projects in Urban Areas—2nd Edition

Dear Colleagues,

Despite the rapid developments of techniques in underground projects, tunneling through heterogeneous and discontinuous geo-materials is still rather complicated and problematic, especially for urban areas. For instance, irregular inclusions and complex joint morphology are hard to quantify and replicate in numerical and physical analysis, which may lead to a rough estimation of mechanical properties of geo-materials. In addition, underground projects in urban areas usually cross stratums with adverse geological conditions, excessive settlement, structure damage or water leakage, all of which occur frequently, greatly weakening the safety and durability of underground projects.

Therefore, appropriate treatments are urgently needed to improve the mechanical properties of surrounding rocks and control the deformations and damages of underground structures. The aim of this Special Issue, entitled “The Development of Underground Projects in Urban Areas—2nd Edition” is to gather original fundamental and applied research related to the numerical models and advanced treatments of heterogeneous and discontinuous geo-materials and underground structures. Potential topics include, but are not limited to, the following topics:

1. Advanced algorithms to quantify morphology characteristics of heterogeneous and discontinuous geo-materials;
2. Constitutive models of heterogeneous and discontinuous materials;
3. High-performance computation methods for heterogeneous and discontinuous materials;
4. Advanced treatments for surrounding rocks and underground structures during tunneling in heterogeneous geo-materials;
5. Settlement prediction and control during tunneling in heterogeneous geo-materials;
6. Three-dimensional mechanical behavior of urban underground structure under complex environment;
7. Safety evaluation for urban underground structure under complex environment;
8. Regulation, planning, environmental assessment, investment, management of underground projects in urban areas.

Dr. Jianjun Ma
Prof. Dr. Mingfeng Lei
Dr. Yu Liang
Dr. Yuexiang Lin
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Sustainability is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• heterogeneous geomaterials
• numerical method
• deformation control
• settlement treatments
• mechanical behavior
• safety evaluation