Special Issue "Advances in Rock Mechanics and Geotechnical Engineering"

A special issue of Sustainability (ISSN 2071-1050). This special issue belongs to the section "Sustainable Engineering and Science".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 30 December 2021.

Special Issue Editors

Dr. Mahdi Hasanipanah
E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Institute of Research and Development, Duy Tan University, Da Nang 550000, Vietnam
Interests: rock blasting; rock mechanics; mining; artificial intelligence; optimization algorithms
Dr. Danial Jahed Armaghani
E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Civil Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, University of Malaya, 50603 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Interests: rock mechanics; tunneling; blasting environmental issues; piling; slope stability; artificial intelligence and optimization techniques in geotechnics
Special Issues and Collections in MDPI journals
Dr. Jian Zhou
E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
School of Resources and Safety Engineering, Central South University, Changsha 410083, China
Interests: rock mechanics; mining; tunneling; supervised learning; machine learning; metaheuristic algorithms; predictive modeling; rockburst; blasting
Special Issues and Collections in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

The Special Issue entitled “Advances in Rock Mechanics and Geotechnical Engineering” is devoted to the publication of the latest research, field works, and laboratory investigations in the area of rock mechanics and geotechnical engineering. This Special Issue publishes novel contributions in different areas of geotechnical and geomechanical engineering such as slope and embankment, tunneling and underground space technologies, pile and foundation, rock mechanics and rock blasting, excavation and leveling projects, ground improvement techniques, unsaturated soil, practical issues in soft soil, mining technology, geo-environmental engineering, new laboratory testing, applied geology for construction, novel geotechnical construction methods.

The focus of this Special Issue is on the development of computational methods for solving problems in the fields of rock mechanics and geotechnical engineering. Articles submitted to this Special Issue can also be concerned with the most important recent artificial intelligence, optimization algorithms, hybrid intelligent systems, and their applications in the area of geotechnical and mining engineering. In recent years, the mentioned methods are being increasingly used for the applications on most of the nonlinear problems related to the real world. We invite researchers to contribute original research articles as well as review articles that will stimulate the continuing research effort on applications of recent computational and intelligence methods to assess/solve different geotechnical and geomechanical engineering problems.

Dr. Mahdi Hasanipanah
Dr. Danial Jahed Armaghani
Professor Dr. Jian Zhou

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 papers will be 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 1900 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.

Keywords

  • soil and rock mechanics
  • geotechnical and geomechanical engineering
  • geo-environmental engineering
  • mining technology
  • artificial intelligence techniques
  • meta-heuristic and optimization algorithms
  • hybrid intelligent systems

Published Papers (3 papers)

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Research

Article
New Insights of Grouting in Coal Mass: From Small-Scale Experiments to Microstructures
Sustainability 2021, 13(16), 9315; https://doi.org/10.3390/su13169315 - 19 Aug 2021
Viewed by 243
Abstract
Pre-grouting as an effective means for improving the stability of roadways can reduce maintenance costs and maintain safety in complex mining conditions. In the Guobei coal mine in China, a cement pre-grouting technique was adopted to enhance the overall strength of soft coal [...] Read more.
Pre-grouting as an effective means for improving the stability of roadways can reduce maintenance costs and maintain safety in complex mining conditions. In the Guobei coal mine in China, a cement pre-grouting technique was adopted to enhance the overall strength of soft coal mass and provide sufficient support for the roadway. However, there are very limited studies about the effect of grouting on the overall strength of coal in the laboratory. In this paper, based on the field observation of a coal-grout structure after grouting, a series of direct shear tests were conducted on coal and grouted coal specimens to quantitatively evaluate the quality improvement of grouted coal mass. The results showed that the peak and residual shear strength, cohesion, friction angle and the shear stiffness of grouted coal were significantly improved with the increase of the diameter of grout column. Linear regression models were established for predicting these mechanical parameters. In addition, three failure models associated with coal and grouted coal specimens were revealed. According to microstructure and macroscopic failure performance of specimens, the application of the proposed models and some methods for further improving the stability of grouted coal mass were suggested. The research can provide the basic evaluation and guideline for the parametric design of cement pre-grouting applications in soft coal mass. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Advances in Rock Mechanics and Geotechnical Engineering)
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Article
Study on Evolution Mechanism of Structure-Type Rockburst: Insights from Discrete Element Modeling
Sustainability 2021, 13(14), 8036; https://doi.org/10.3390/su13148036 - 19 Jul 2021
Viewed by 316
Abstract
Taking the “11.28” rockburst occurred in the Jinping II Hydropower Station as the engineering background, the evolution mechanism of structure-type rockburst was studied in detail based on the particle flow code. The results indicate that the failure mechanism of structure-type rockburst includes a [...] Read more.
Taking the “11.28” rockburst occurred in the Jinping II Hydropower Station as the engineering background, the evolution mechanism of structure-type rockburst was studied in detail based on the particle flow code. The results indicate that the failure mechanism of structure-type rockburst includes a tensile fracture induced by tangential compressive stress and a shear fracture caused by shear stress due to overburdened loadings and shear slip on the structural plane. In addition, it is found that the differences between structure-type rockburst and strainburst mainly include (a) the distribution of the local concentrated stress zone after excavation, (b) the evolution mechanism, and (c) the failure locations. Finally, the influence of four factors on the structure-type rockburst are explored. The results show that (1) when the friction coefficient is greater than 0.5, the effect of structural plane is weakened, and the rock near excavation tends to be intact, the structural-type rockburst intensity decreases; (2) the dissipated and radiated energy in structural-type rockburst reduces with rockmass heterogeneity m; (3) the lateral pressure coefficient has a significant effect on the intensity of deep rock failure, specifically in the form of the rapid growth in dissipative energy; (4) and the structural-type rockburst is more pronounced at a structural plane length near 90 mm. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Advances in Rock Mechanics and Geotechnical Engineering)
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Article
Statistical Assessment of the Effects of Grain-Structure Representation and Micro-Properties on the Behavior of Bonded Block Models for Brittle Rock Damage Prediction
Sustainability 2021, 13(14), 7889; https://doi.org/10.3390/su13147889 - 14 Jul 2021
Viewed by 426
Abstract
The ability to predict the mechanical behavior of brittle rocks using bonded block models (BBM) depends on the accuracy of the geometrical representation of the grain-structure and the applied micro-properties. This paper evaluates the capabilities of BBMs for predictive purposes using an approach [...] Read more.
The ability to predict the mechanical behavior of brittle rocks using bonded block models (BBM) depends on the accuracy of the geometrical representation of the grain-structure and the applied micro-properties. This paper evaluates the capabilities of BBMs for predictive purposes using an approach that employs published micro-properties in combination with a Voronoi BBM that properly approximates the real rock grain-structure. The Wausau granite, with Unconfined Compressive Strength (UCS) of 226 MPa and average grain diameter of 2 mm, is used to evaluate the effectiveness of the predictive approach. Four published sets of micro-properties calibrated for granites with similar mineralogy to the Wausau granite are used for the assessment. The effect of grain-structure representation in Voronoi BBMs is analyzed, considering grain shape, grain size and mineral arrangement. A unique contribution of this work is the explicit consideration of the effect of stochastic grain-structure generation on the obtained results. The study results show that the macro-properties of a rock can be closely replicated using the proposed approach. When using this approach, the micro-properties have a greater impact on the realism of the predictions than the specific grain-structure representation. The grain shape and grain size representations have a minor effect on the predictions for cases that do not deviate substantially from the real average grain geometry. However, the stochastic effect introduced by the use of randomly-generated Voronoi grain-structures can be significant, and this effect should be considered in future studies. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Advances in Rock Mechanics and Geotechnical Engineering)
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