A novel design approach for sustainable and resilient railway formations. The project aims to validate a novel design approach for more sustainable and resilient railway formations. The railway network underpins the Australian economy and its maintenance costs tens of millions of dollars every year. This cost will increase with the growing frequency and intensity of climatic events. The research will advance the knowledge on the effect of water on the performance of railway formations and will d ....A novel design approach for sustainable and resilient railway formations. The project aims to validate a novel design approach for more sustainable and resilient railway formations. The railway network underpins the Australian economy and its maintenance costs tens of millions of dollars every year. This cost will increase with the growing frequency and intensity of climatic events. The research will advance the knowledge on the effect of water on the performance of railway formations and will deliver a novel design tool for end-users that will allow engineers to recycle fouled ballast in formations . The project will yield significant financial benefits for Australia, will strengthen links between Academia and industry partners, and will address environmental and sustainability issues linked to fouled ballast.
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Building green roads with gasified municipal solid waste composites. This project aims to develop gasified municipal solid waste composites as a novel and green road material. This project expects to generate new knowledge on the fundamental properties of the developed waste composites when used as road subgrades and bases, through experimental study, physical modelling, numerical simulation, and field trials. Expected outcomes include understanding the mechanical behaviour of these waste compos ....Building green roads with gasified municipal solid waste composites. This project aims to develop gasified municipal solid waste composites as a novel and green road material. This project expects to generate new knowledge on the fundamental properties of the developed waste composites when used as road subgrades and bases, through experimental study, physical modelling, numerical simulation, and field trials. Expected outcomes include understanding the mechanical behaviour of these waste composites under static and cyclic loads, development of versatile constitutive models and numerical analysis tools, and determination of their optimal performance. Benefits include diversion of municipal and demolition wastes from landfills and the development of sustainable materials and technology for future roads.Read moreRead less
Early Career Industry Fellowships - Grant ID: IE230100410
Funder
Australian Research Council
Funding Amount
$452,085.00
Summary
Bridging the gap between rockfall theory and engineering practice. Fragmentation is often observed post rockfall events and it is recognised as a critical aspect of adequate rockfall risk management. Yet, rockfall fragmentation is a complex phenomenon still poorly understood and not properly considered in engineering practice. This project aims at developing a theoretical and stochastic fragmentation framework, based on high-quality and comprehensive experimental data, in collaboration with lead ....Bridging the gap between rockfall theory and engineering practice. Fragmentation is often observed post rockfall events and it is recognised as a critical aspect of adequate rockfall risk management. Yet, rockfall fragmentation is a complex phenomenon still poorly understood and not properly considered in engineering practice. This project aims at developing a theoretical and stochastic fragmentation framework, based on high-quality and comprehensive experimental data, in collaboration with leading international industry partners that provide advanced geotechnical design tools to practitioners around the world. The outcomes of the project will bridge the gap between rockfall theory and engineering practice. It will allow for more cost-effective and safer design of rockfall protection structures.Read moreRead less
Pile foundations in unsaturated soils: a mechanistic framework. This project will develop a mechanistic approach to pile foundation design in variably saturated soils through integrated expertise in the fields of unsaturated soil mechanics, material nonlinearity, numerical modelling, limit analysis and experimental investigation. It will achieve a rigorous understanding of pile behaviour in unsaturated
soils subjected to monotonic loading through a comprehensive program of scaled laboratory test ....Pile foundations in unsaturated soils: a mechanistic framework. This project will develop a mechanistic approach to pile foundation design in variably saturated soils through integrated expertise in the fields of unsaturated soil mechanics, material nonlinearity, numerical modelling, limit analysis and experimental investigation. It will achieve a rigorous understanding of pile behaviour in unsaturated
soils subjected to monotonic loading through a comprehensive program of scaled laboratory testing, numerical and theoretical analyses. The models, theories, mechanics and predictive tools arising from this research will have direct and immediate impact on the planning, design, construction and management of many types of infrastructure involving pile foundations in industrial and residential developments.Read moreRead less
Transforming Current Design Practice for Controlled Modulus Columns . Current design methods used for Controlled Modulus Column-supported embankments are outdated and uneconomical. This project aims to use innovative numerical and image processing techniques to develop new design methods that use 100% recyclable, environmentally friendly and highly durable EPS geofoam. Outcomes will advance the fundamental knowledge of bearing capacity increase of columns due to formation of smear zone and damag ....Transforming Current Design Practice for Controlled Modulus Columns . Current design methods used for Controlled Modulus Column-supported embankments are outdated and uneconomical. This project aims to use innovative numerical and image processing techniques to develop new design methods that use 100% recyclable, environmentally friendly and highly durable EPS geofoam. Outcomes will advance the fundamental knowledge of bearing capacity increase of columns due to formation of smear zone and damages to nearby columns during installation. Numerical tools and design guidelines will be developed for engineers. The benefits include the design and construction of lighter, cheaper, safer and more stable embankments with significant cost and environmental gains from future infrastructure developments in Australia.Read moreRead less
Anisotropic behaviour of natural soft soils. This project aims to improve current engineering analysis methods, which often fail to predict the performance of infrastructure built on natural soft soils. This project expects to develop a theoretical and mathematical framework to describe the response of soft soils to complex loading patterns imposed by transport and energy infrastructure. This will be informed by advanced laboratory experiments that transcend the capabilities of routine testing m ....Anisotropic behaviour of natural soft soils. This project aims to improve current engineering analysis methods, which often fail to predict the performance of infrastructure built on natural soft soils. This project expects to develop a theoretical and mathematical framework to describe the response of soft soils to complex loading patterns imposed by transport and energy infrastructure. This will be informed by advanced laboratory experiments that transcend the capabilities of routine testing methods. The expected outcome of the project is a series of tools for the engineering analysis of earthworks and foundations built on soft soils that will underpin the construction of civil infrastructure on ground often too poor to be considered for other use.Read moreRead less
Assessment of Dynamic Pile Driving Using Machine Learning. This project aims at developing new technology to determine ground properties and foundation capacity in real-time during pile installation by adopting rigorous numerical simulation, laboratory experiments and artificial intelligence-based computational model. Although impact driving is used commonly to install piles on site, there is no technology currently available to interpret collected data accurately and in real-time to provide liv ....Assessment of Dynamic Pile Driving Using Machine Learning. This project aims at developing new technology to determine ground properties and foundation capacity in real-time during pile installation by adopting rigorous numerical simulation, laboratory experiments and artificial intelligence-based computational model. Although impact driving is used commonly to install piles on site, there is no technology currently available to interpret collected data accurately and in real-time to provide live feedback and optimise construction processes. This research will provide new machine learning model to assess the ground and foundation characteristics during construction, and will increase certainty in infrastructure investment in Australia particularly for costly transport assets and infrastructure.Read moreRead less
Bottom-up multiscale modelling of expansive soils in natural environments . Expansive soils, highly sensitive to the environment, undergo dramatic strength and volume changes. This project aims to advance our understanding of expansive soils under different temperatures, hydraulic conditions, mechanical loads, and aqueous salinities. The project expects to use a combination of multidisciplinary knowledge, multiscale experiments and numerical simulations. The outcomes are a new multiscale model a ....Bottom-up multiscale modelling of expansive soils in natural environments . Expansive soils, highly sensitive to the environment, undergo dramatic strength and volume changes. This project aims to advance our understanding of expansive soils under different temperatures, hydraulic conditions, mechanical loads, and aqueous salinities. The project expects to use a combination of multidisciplinary knowledge, multiscale experiments and numerical simulations. The outcomes are a new multiscale model and advanced analysis/design tool for evaluating the performance of expansive soils under different conditions. The outcomes should provide the efficient way to mitigate the significant damage caused to infrastructure by expansive soils and facilitate the application of expansive soil products in waste disposal systems.Read moreRead less
Infrastructure on reactive soils: fundamental advances and validation. This project aims to advance fundamental knowledge on the complex behaviour of reactive soils in the context of resilient geotechnical infrastructure. This research falls within the research priority “Environmental Change”, as geotechnical infrastructure need to sustain the impact of ever more frequent and more intense climatic actions. Attention will focus on the effect of suction on volume change and shear strength of react ....Infrastructure on reactive soils: fundamental advances and validation. This project aims to advance fundamental knowledge on the complex behaviour of reactive soils in the context of resilient geotechnical infrastructure. This research falls within the research priority “Environmental Change”, as geotechnical infrastructure need to sustain the impact of ever more frequent and more intense climatic actions. Attention will focus on the effect of suction on volume change and shear strength of reactive soils, two poorly understood features, and will produce a swelling model and a soil-deformable structure interaction model. After validation by a case study, the models will have the potential to empower industry to produce geotechnical infrastructure that can better sustain climatic actions.Read moreRead less
Biocemented recycled glass columns: Green technology for ground improvement. This project aims to develop a green ground improvement technology using biocemented recycled glass column inclusions. This project expects to generate new knowledge on the performance of novel biocemented glass wastes when used as ground inclusions to improve the engineering properties of problematic soils subjected to traffic loads, through experimental, numerical approaches and field trials. Expected outcomes include ....Biocemented recycled glass columns: Green technology for ground improvement. This project aims to develop a green ground improvement technology using biocemented recycled glass column inclusions. This project expects to generate new knowledge on the performance of novel biocemented glass wastes when used as ground inclusions to improve the engineering properties of problematic soils subjected to traffic loads, through experimental, numerical approaches and field trials. Expected outcomes include evaluating the performance of biocemented recycled glass via experiments, establishing constitutive models, developing numerical tools and building enduring collaborations with industry. Benefits include diversion of wastes from landfills, reduction in greenhouse gas emissions and commercial applications of glass wastes.Read moreRead less