ALERT GeomaterialsNEWSLETTER - September 2018N 16 - year 12 http://alertgeomaterials.eu

In This Issue . . .EDITORIAL 1ALERT Workshop 2017 2 ALERT Workshop 2018 5ALERT PhD Prize 2017 2 ALERT Doctoral School 2018 5ALERT Doctoral School 2017 3 ALERT Olek Zienkiewicz Course 2018 6ALERT Special Lecture 2017 4 New Member of ALERT 7ALERT Olek Zienkiewicz Course 2017 4 ALERT Special Lecture 2018 7

Impressions of AussoisPhotographs of the photo

competition 2012

EDITORIAL

Dear ALERT members,

during the last ALERT Workshop in Aussois 2017(almost one year ago!), the General Assemblyelected 15 colleagues who will compose the newBoard of Directors for the period October 2017-October 2020. They are (in alphabetical order):

Frédéric Collin (Liège, Belgium), Claudio di Prisco(Milano, Italy), Ivo Herle (Dresden, Germany),Cristina Jommi (Milano, Italy), Panos Kotronis(Nantes, France), David Mašín (Prague, the CzechRepublic), François Nicot (Grenoble, France), Eu-ripides Papamichos (Thessaloniki, Greece), ManuelPastor (Madrid, Spain), Lorenzo Sanavia (Padova,Italy), Jean Sulem (Paris, France), Claudio Tam-agnini (Perugia, Italy), Jean Vaunat (Barcelona,Spain), Cino Viggiani (Grenoble, France), and An-tonis Zervos (Southampton, UK).

The very first task of the Board was to appoint anew “bureau”, including a Director, two vice di-rectors and a president. Which they did: FrédéricCollin from Liège, Belgium, is the new directorof ALERT; Claudia Vitone from Bari, Italy, is thenew vice-director for administration, and StéphaneGrange from Lyon, France, is confirmed in his roleof vice-director for finances. Cino Viggiani fromGrenoble, France, is the new president. This bu-reau is almost entirely new – the only “expert”member being Stéphane. This is why it was de-cided to also enroll in the bureau Andrea Galli fromMilano, Italy, in the newly created role of “assistantdirector”, to help the new team to handle the lifeof ALERT-Geomaterials thanks to his longstandingexperience. Moreover, Frédéric resigned from hisposition of elected member of the board, and it wasdecided to replace him with the first non-elected

candidate: Jelke Dikstra (Chalmers, Sweden).

We are fully aware that this Newsletter comesquite late – much later than over the last years.However, you bet we’ve been working hard forALERT-Geomaterials since October 2017. Besidesthe organization of the workshop and doctoralschool that will take place in Aussois in Octoberthis year, we have set the program for the OlekZienkiewicz Course, that will be held in Bari inNovember this year, and we have managed theIoannis Vardoulakis PhD Prize – for which we havereceived 10 applications.

Finally, we have decided to support the new ini-tiative “Open Geomechanics”, an open access ge-omechanics journal that was launched in early2018 (the people behind this effort are listed here:http://www.opengeomechanics.org). To make itclear: “Open Geomechanics” will not be an ALERTjournal, nor will there be any editorial exchangesbetween “Open Geomechanics” and ALERT. Finan-cially speaking, “Open Geomechanics” will be com-pletely independent of ALERT. We have only com-mitted to be their legally responsible associationfor the next two years.

It is a great pleasure for us to open a new “ALERT”year, hopefully rich of research and educationalevents, in the very spirit of our association, whichis creating and sharing knowledge in geomechan-ics. We’re happy and proud to serve the communityduring our three-year appointment. We hope to beup to the level set by the previous bureau, and wecount on your active help and contribution!

See you all in Aussois!

Frédéric Collin and Cino Viggiani

ALERT Geomaterials Page 2

0 10 20 30 40 50

Bari

Bochum

Chalmers

Charles

Delft

ECL

ECN

ENPC

ENS Cachan

EPFL

ETH Zurich

Grenoble

HWU

Innsbruck

INSA-Lyon

IRSTEA

Liege

Lund

Marid

McGill

Milano

Montpellier 2

NTNU

NTU Athens

Padova

Perugia

Southampton

Strathclyde

Tessaloniki

Torino

TU Dresded

Tunis

UPC

UPPA

Non member

Participants of the ALERTWorkshop 2017

ALERT Workshop 2017

In 2017 the annual ALERT Workshop was heldfrom Monday, 2nd until Wednesday, 4th Oc-tober again in Aussois, France. The regionaldistribution of the participants from the insti-tutional members of ALERT Geomaterials isshown on the left hand side. In total, 182 par-ticipants registered for the ALERT workshop2017.

As it was introduced in 2013, the session onTuesday lasted only half a day allowing theBoard of Directors meeting, the PhD-prize cer-emony and the Special lecture to be held inthe afternoon.

The three topics of the ALERT Workshop 2017are listed below:

1 Porous Media Mechanics from geoma-

terials to non-geological mediacoord. W.G. Gray, B. Schrefler, & C. Tam-agnini

2 Must Critical State Theory for GranularMechanics be Revisited?coord. Y.F. Dafalias, G. Viggiani

3 Advanced numerical modelling of ge-omaterials with emphasis on large de-formation and flow problemscoord. M.A. Hicks, P. Mira, & L. Sanavia

We thank all active participants and coordina-tors for their effort.

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Anne-Catherine Dieudonne(Université de Liège)

Xiusong Shi(Technische Universität Dresden)

ALERT PhD Prize 2017

The jury of the ALERT PhD Prize 2017 wascomposed of the professors Manuel Pastor(Universidad Politécnica de Madrid), WilliamG. Gray (University of North Carolina, ChapelHill and University of Vermont, Burlington),Antonis Zervos (University of Southampton)and David Masin (Charles University Prague).Only PhD students from one of the institutionsbelonging to ALERT are eligible candidates forthe prize which is dated to 1000 Euro.

The three finalists Dieudonné Anne-Catherine(Université de Liège), Shi Xiusong (Technis-che Universität Dresden) and Vrakas Aposto-los (ETH Zurich) were chosen by the jury outof 8 applications.

The jury awarded the PhD student Anne-

Catherine Dieudonné for her work enti-tled

Hydromechanical behaviour ofcompacted bentonite: from

micro-scale analysis to macro-scalemodelling

and the PhD student Xiusong Shi for his workentitled

Deformation behaviour ofmulti-porosity soils in landfills

The abstract of both PhD thesis are availableon the ALERT website.

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ALERT Geomaterials Page 3

0 5 10 15 20 25

Bari

Bochum

Chalmers

Charles

Delft

ECL

ECN

ENPC

ENS Cachan

EPFL

ETH Zurich

Grenoble

HWU

Innsbruck

INSA-Lyon

IRSTEA

Liege

Lund

Marid

McGill

Milano

Montpellier 2

NTNU

NTU Athens

Padova

Perugia

Southampton

Strathclyde

Tessaloniki

Torino

TU Dresded

Tunis

UPC

UPPA

Non member

Participants of the ALERTDoctoral School 2017

ALERT Doctoral School 2017

The ALERT Doctoral School 2017 lasted fromThursday, 5th October to Saturday, 7th Octo-ber and was attended by 94 participants. Theschool was dedicated to

Discrete Element Modeling

The organization was carried out by GaëlCombe (Laboratoire 3SR Grenoble) and Ste-fan Luding (University Twente). The accom-panying book, containing articles referringto the lectures, can be downloaded from theALERT website.

The lectures were presented by

• Stefan Luding (University of Twente)• Christophe Martin (Université Grenoble

Alpes)• Farhang Radjai (University of Montpellier)• Gaël Combe (Université Grenoble Alpes)• Vanessa Magnanimo (University of

Twente)• Kianoosh Taghizadeh (University of

Twente)• Frédéric Victor Donzé (Université Greno-

ble Alpes)• Jean-Yves Delenne (University of Montpel-

lier)• Vincent Richefeu (Université Grenoble

Alpes)• Anthony Thornton (University of Twente)

The purpose of the scholl was to present thebasic concepts of particle simulation methodsand their application to classical and modernproblems of geomechanics

In order to tackle this topic, the first two daysof the school were divided into :

• Simulation (molecular Dynamics, EventDriven, DEM basics)

• Advanced contact laws for DEM applica-tions

• Contact Dynamics• Good practice and sample preparation• DEM applied to Soils Mechanics• DEM applied to Rock Mechanics• Granular rheology, granular matter, dense

flows and micro-macro transition• LBM method for Fluid/Grain coupling

On Saturday, these lectures were followed upby 2 parallel sessions of practical computerexercises: for beginners and for experts.

On behalf all the ALERT members we wantto thank the lecturers and the organizers fortheir commitment.

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The accompanying book, containing articles referring to the lectures, as well assome books of previously held doctoral schools can be downloaded from the ALERTwebsite.

http://alertgeomaterials.eu/publications/

ALERT Geomaterials Page 4

The ALERT Special Lecturer 2017Prof. W.G. GRAY

Special Lecture 2017: Prof. William G. Gray

The ALERT Special lecture 2017 was deliv-ered by Prof. William Gray from the Univer-sity of North Carolina in USA

The title of the lecture was:

Systematic Description of MultiphaseFlow in Porous Media

The lecture was digitized during the presenta-tion and is available for downloading on theALERT website.

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Organising Institutions of theALERT OZ Course 2017

ALERT Olek Zienkiewicz Course 2017

The 10th ALERT Olek Zienkiewicz Course washeld for five days in June 2017 in Assisi, Italy.

The school is organised by Cristina Jommi(Delft University of Technology, the Nether-lands) and Claudio Tamagnini (University ofPerugia, Italy).

The topic of the Course was

Geotechnics of soft and organic soils

Lectures and tutorials covered several issues:

• Fundamental behaviour• Constitutive modelling• Modelling and numerical Implementation• Engineering of soft soils

The 10th ALERT Olek Zienkiewicz Course wasattended by 54 PhD students and 2 YoungDoctors from 21 Countries (including the stu-dents of the LARAM School).

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ALERT Geomaterials Page 5

Organising Institutions of theALERT Workshop & School 2018

ALERT Workshop 2018

The ALERT Workshop in 2018 will be orga-nized from Monday, 1st October to Wednes-day, 3rd October. The workshop will againtake place in the Centre Paul Langevin in Aus-sois, France.

The focus of the three workshop sessions andthe responsible coordinators are listed below:

1 Fluid flow and strain localization: fin-gering and fracture processes in par-tially saturated materialscoord. F. Casini, G. Sciarra & J. Vaunatfrancesca.casini@uniroma2.itgiulio.sciarra@gmail.comjean.vaunat@upc.edu

2 Geomaterials under the nanoscope

coord. R. Pellenq, F. Radjai & F.J. Ulmpellenq@mit.edufranck.radjai@umontpellier.frulm@mit.edu

3 Offshore Geotechnicscoord. F. Pisano, K.G. Gavin & G. EiksundF.Pisano@tudelft.nlK.G.Gavin@tudelft.nlgudmund.eiksund@ntnu.no

The first and third sessions (Monday andWednesday, respectively) are open to abstractsubmission, when the second half-day sessionon Tuesday will be held by invited speakersonly.

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The online registration for the ALERT Workshop & School is open.http://alertgeomaterials.eu/2018/07/registration-for-the-alert-workshop-school-2018-is-open/

Organising Institutions of theALERT School 2018

ALERT Doctoral School 2018

The workshop is followed by the ALERT Doc-toral School which will be hosted from Thurs-day, 4th October to Saturday, 6th October alsoin Aussois. The topic of the ALERT School willbe dedicated to

Energetical methods in geomechanics

and will be organized by I. Einav (Universityof Sydney) and E. Gerolymatou (ChalmersUniversity of Technology).

Lectures will be held on the first two days ofthe workshop and will include the followingtopics:

• Basic thermodynamic definitions• Definition and uses of virtual power• Energetics in granular media from the

viewpoint of DEM

• Landau’s approach for advanced thermo-dynamics

• Hierarchal derivation of constitutive rela-tionships using thermodynamics

• Energetical background of common ap-proaches

• Multiphysics and multicomponent applica-tions

• From Fracture to Breakage Mechanics

On Saturday, exercise examples will evidencethe effect of constitutive choices on the en-ergetics. The Lectures will be held by MarioLIU, Ioannis STEFANOU, François GUILLARD,Itai EINAV, Eleni GEROLYMATOU, ManolisVEVEAKIS, and Yida ZHANG.

The online registration for the ALERT Work-shop & School is open on the ALERT website.

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ALERT Geomaterials Page 6

Bari, Italy

Organising Institutions of theALERT Olek Zienkiewicz Course

2018

ALERT Olek Zienkiewicz Course 2018

The 11th edition of the ALERT OlekZienkiewicz Course will be held from Mon-day, 5th November to Friday, 9th November2018 in Bari, Italy. The topic of the schoolis

Natural versus compacted clayey soils:from micro to macro behaviour and

modelling

The school is organised by Federica Cotec-chia (Polytechnic University of Bari), JeanVaunat (Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya -BarcelonaTech), Claudia Vitone (PolytechnicUniversity of Bari).

Abstract: The theme chosen for the OlekZienkiewicz Winterschool 2018 has been sub-ject of intense research aimed at yieldingthe impact that micro to meso-scale phenom-ena of different typology (i.e. mechanical,physico-chemical, thermal, electromagnetic)have on the behaviour of soils and rocks at themacro-scale. The school will focus on clayeysoils, either natural, or compacted, and pro-vide knowledge about their genesis and conse-quent features at the micro to meso-scale, andabout how their macro-response varies withthe micro to meso-features. Particular empha-sis will be given to the either experimental,or modelling research contributions that haveprovided new evidence and understanding ofthe phenomena at the micro to meso-scale,that generate observable trends in macro-response. The lectures will concern, as first,the fundamentals about the genesis of claysof different structure, either consolidated orcompacted, and about the different scales ofstructures in clays. Thereafter, they will dealwith the analysis and modelling of the hydro-mechanical behaviour of the clayey materi-als characterized at the micro- to meso-scale.Hence, the course will provide an overview of

the up-to-date studies that have representedmajor paradigms in improving both the un-derstanding of the relationships between themacro-response of classes of clayey soils andtheir micro to meso-features, and the mod-elling of their behaviour. Starting from thebasics of mineralogy and particle interactions,up to basic hydro-mechanical response of re-constituted and natural clays, sensitive andnot, the lectures will also focus on the behav-ior of hard soils, soft rocks and transitionalsoils, as well as on the effects of weather-ing, high organic content and fissuring. TheALERT OZ Winterchool will be organised in4 hours morning and afternoon sessions, thatwill be delivered by experienced lecturerscoming from different universities: Univer-sitat Politecnica de Catalunya, University Col-lege London, Université Grenoble Alpes, Ecoledes Ponts Paris Tech., Politecnico di Bari, Po-litecnico di Milano, Sapienza University ofRome, Purdue University.

Lectures covering the following topics as wellas practical sessions on some of them will bedelivered:

• Fundamentals about the genesis of claysand different scales of structures

• Consolidated unfissured clays: fundamen-tals to advanced analysis of the mechani-cal behaviour

• Compacted clays: fundamentals to ad-vanced analysis of the mechanical be-haviour

• Hard clays/weak claystones: analysis andmodelling of the hydro-mechanical be-haviour

• Transitional soils, fissured and weath-ered clays: analysis of the mechanical be-haviour

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For more details as well as the online registration form please visit the ALERT web-site:

http://alertgeomaterials.eu/category/oz-course

ALERT Geomaterials Page 7

New Institutional Member of ALERT

During its meeting in Aussois, held in October2017, there was no new application for themembership in ALERT Geomaterials.

Francesca Casini (University of Tor Vergata)becomes an associated member of Universityof Perugia. Giuseppe Modoni (University of

Cassino) also becomes an associated memberof University of Grenoble (this was decidedin 2016, but it becomes effective in October2017).

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The ALERT Special Lecturer 2018Prof. Rolland Pellenq

Special Lecture 2018: Prof. Rolland Pellenq

The Special lecture during the coming ALERTWorkshop 2018 will be presented by Prof. Rol-land Pellenq, Director of Research at CNRS,the French Government Agency for ScientificResearch and a MIT Senior Research Scientist.He will talk about

The potential of mean force: the toolto model dense colloidal systems

We investigate the interactions responsible forthe cohesion of strongly interacting colloidalmaterials such as clays, cement... It is knownthat the swelling/cohesive properties of thesematerials depend both on the nature of thesome counter-ions compensating their surfacecharge along with the water intake. The over-all goal of this work is to determine the rightlevel of modeling complexity required to cap-ture the behavior of these charged colloids im-mersed in an electrolyte and set up the stagefor modeling at the meso-scale. From the

(analytical) mean-field DLVO theory to a fullatomistic description, we introduce the con-cept of “Potential of Mean Force” as the toolto get an efficient but still realistic descriptionbetween strongly interacting colloidal grainssuch as clay and cement hydrate nanoparti-cles. In particular, we introduced the ExplicitSolvent Primitive Model (ESPM), in whichions are modeled as charged hard spheresand solvent molecules as soft spheres withembedded point dipoles. We showed that tak-ing explicitly into account the solvent in sucha Primitive Model description, allows a quan-titative description of system’s cohesion inquantitative agreement with atomistic scaleresults. From ionic correlation interactionsto pure electrostatics, the ESPM approach isshown to be an efficient strategy to get a trulyconsistent multi-scale modeling approach ofcomplex systems.

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