The ALERT Geomaterials Workshop 2018 will be organized from Monday, 1st October until Wednesday, 3rd October in Aussois, France. It will include the following sessions:

SESSION 1 (1st October):

“Fluid flow and strain localization: fingering and fracture processes in partially saturated materials”

Organizers:

• Francesca Casini  (Università di Roma TorVergata)
• Giulio Sciarra (Ecole Centrale de Nantes)
• Jean Vaunat (UPC)

The workshop aims at establishing a bridge between two different scientific communities working on two different aspects of hydro-mechanical instabilities in partially saturated media. On the one hand the one studying fluid-grain displacement regimes through initially saturated granular media due to the infiltration of a wetting (imbibition) or a non-wetting (drainage) fluid. On the other hand the one whose main interest concerns the study of strain and porosity localization into (partially) saturated granular media induced by mechanical loading. The goal is to define a common framework for treating the hydraulic and the mechanical instabilities in granular media together with their mechanical and hydraulic effects.

Contributions into phase-field modeling, level-set methods, discrete elements and numerical methods, as well as Hele-Shaw experiments, X-ray micro-tomographic imaging of pore-scale displacements and imaging of the fluid front through fractures by neutron radiography and tomography are expected and welcome.

SESSION 2 (2nd October, half-day): “Geomaterials under the nanoscope”

Organizers:

• Roland Pellenq (MIT)
• Farhang Radjai (université de Montpellier)
• Franz Josef Ulm (MIT)

In this workshop, we consider geomaterials at the very fine scales where chemistry becomes important for the upscaling approach. The workshop will bring together geomechanics, physics, chemistry and material science researchers for developing an integrated approach (combining both simulation and experiments) for the prediction of texture properties from angstroms to micron and their evolution in time from nanoseconds to years of complex multi-scale materials such as clays and cement. The conceptual tool of such an integrated approach is what we have called the “nanoscope” that should combine advanced statistical physics, numerical simulations (such as accelerated Molecular Dynamics) and experiments (such as X-Ray tomography and microscopy…). This “nanoscope” tools aims at elucidating the 3D texture of those multi-scale materials from the scale of atoms to microns focusing in particular on mechanical and transport properties. The coupling between numerical simulation and experiments is a major theme and is one of the most challenging issues in the field.

SESSION 3 (3rd October): “Offshore Geotechnics”

Organizers:

• Ken Gavin (TU Delft)
• Federico Pisanò (TU Delft)
• Gudmund Eiksund (NTNU)

The session will make a unique opportunity to overview trending topics in the field of Offshore Geotechnics. Current industry developments are indeed mobilising substantial research in the area worldwide, especially in relation to harvesting offshore renewable energy from wind, waves and tides. Marine geotechnics plays here a prominent role, as a significant portion of the targeted cost reduction requires optimised foundation/transmission systems, including shallow and deep foundations, anchors, pipelines and power cables.

Both fundamental and applied contributions are welcome to identify and discuss state-of-the-art approaches to theoretical, experimental and numerical analysis. Particularly appreciated will be research concerning soil behaviour and soil-structure interaction under cyclic/dynamic loading, as well as novel methods to predict the installation performance of offshore foundation systems.

The ALERT Workshop will be followed by the ALERT Doctoral School 2018 on Energetical methods in geomechanics.