The 14th ALERT Olek Zienkiewicz course was held in Aix-en-Provence, France, from April 22nd to April 26th 2024. It was organized by the research unit RECOVER from Aix-Marseille University, INRAE in relation with the doctoral school 353 “Engineering sciences: Mechanics, Physics, Micro et Nano-electronics”.
It focused on: “Hydro-mechanical behavior of geomaterials for civil engineering structures”
The content of the course addressed the characterization and the modeling of the hydro-mechanical behavior of geomaterials from the microscale to the structure scale. It covered both theoretical models, simulations, lab testing and risk analysis aspects.

In details, the sessions were the following:
1- Hydraulic actions on soil: erosion, hydro-mechanical instabilities (P. Philippe, 2h)
2- Mechanical behavior of granular materials (N. Benahmed, 2h)
3- Mechanical instabilities and failure in granular materials (A. Wautier, 2h)
4- Mixing properties in granular media (M. Souzy, 2h)
5- The Discrete Element Method (DEM): a numerical modeling approach adapted to geomaterials (J. Duriez, 2h)
6- Practical session: Implementation of a 1D minimal DEM code and introduction to YADE (A. Wautier, 3h)
7- Multi-phase Lattice Boltzmann Method (LBM) and its Application to Partially Saturated Granular Soils (Theory and Practice) (N. Younes, 2h)
8- Simulating large displacement problems in Continuum Mechanics with the Material Point Method (MPM) and CB-Geo MPM – PyCBG softwares (J. Duriez, 2h30)
9- Safety assessment of civil engineering structures (L. Peyras, 2h)
10- Uncertainty propagation and reliability analysis (C. Carvajal, 2h)
11- Practical session: Mechano-fiabilistic computations for the risk assesment of the rupture of a dam (L. Peyras et C. Carvajal, 2h)

For more information regarding the course, you can contact antoine.wautier@inrae.fr, pierre.philippe@inrae.fr or nadia.benahmed@inrae.fr.