• Geotechnical Engineering
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• v.12 no.5
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• pp.17-26
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• 1996

The undrained behavior of Asan marine soil was investigated by using an automated triaxial testing device. The stress-strain behavior at the preand postfailure state of marine soil under undrained compression and eatension conditions was compared with the behavior of pure silt, pure clay and the overall behavior of Asan marine soil was predicted with the modified Camflay model and the bounding surface model. The marine soil sampled in Asan bay area was clayey silts with 70oA silt-30% clay content and the testing samples were prepared in both undisturbed and remolded conditions. All samples are normally consolidated with 400 kPa of effective mean confining pressure and each sample is unloaded to 200, 100, 67 kPa, respectively. And then the shear test was performed with different confining pressure. According to experimental results, there exists an unique failure line whose slope is lower than silt's and higher than clay's. It is identified that the undrained shear strength of normally consolidated samples increases after crossing the phase transformation line because of volume dilation tendency which is not seen in clay. Overconsolidated samples show different soil behavior compared with pure silt due to its tendency of change in volume. It is also found that the overall behavior of Asan marine soil cannot be predicted precisely with the modified Cam-clay model and the bounding surface model.

• Journal of the Korean GEO-environmental Society
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• v.12 no.7
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• pp.31-37
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• 2011

Only a few studies have been conducted using reduced slag as recycled material. The reduced slag in electric furnace is produced as a by-product in making a steel and a few applications of the reduced slag as expensive additives and bonding materials or as the stabilized soils was reported. The purpose of this study is to present the feasibility of the reduced slag as recycled material, especially, in a field of civil engineering. In order to achieve the purpose experiments such as SEM and XRF analysis was conducted for the reduced slag in electric furnace. Based on the results various geotechnical experiments were conducted to know engineering properties of slag-soil mixtures. Weathered soils and clay are mixed with reduced slag for various ratios. As the ratio of reduced slag to weathered soil increases, the maximum dry unit weight of the mixture decreased with increasing optimum moisture content. The results indicates that there is no effect on a reduced slag by compaction efforts. The shear strengths of the weathered soil-slag mixtures are slightly higher or similar to those of weathered soils. The permeability of the weathered soil-slag mixtures is similar to that of silty or sandy soils. Therefore, it is possible to use the mixtures as embankment or backfill materials in the fields. The unconfined strength of the mixtures of reduced slag and clay is higher than that of clay and it tends to increase with the curing time. Therefore it can be used to improve the soft ground.

• Journal of the Korean Geosynthetics Society
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• v.23 no.1
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• pp.39-47
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• 2024

In this study, physical property tests and standard consolidation tests were conducted on the marine clay of Busan New Port and North Port, the middle and lower reaches of the Nakdong River including Gimhae and Yangsan, and Ulsan regions. The moisture content, a property unrelated to sample disturbance with small individual test errors, was used for regression analysis with the compression index, virgin compression index, consolidation coefficient, expansion index, and secondary compression index, among others. Subsequently, the correlation and accuracy were evaluated. Upon analyzing the correlation between the moisture content, void ratio, and liquid limit commonly used physical properties for calculating compression indexes, it was confirmed that the liquid limit had the lowest correlation. Through a linear regression analysis of the consolidation constants using the current moisture content in the natural state, a high correlation was demonstrated. Relationship equations were then presented to determine settlement and settlement time. This study suggests that moisture content can be utilized as an alternative for evaluating and calculating consolidation constants when examining ground settlement in sedimentary clays distributed in the Busan and Gyeongnam regions.

• Journal of the Korean Geotechnical Society
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• v.20 no.8
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• pp.113-121
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• 2004

The present study is suggested to estimate the degree of secondary consolidation caused by various changes of stress such as loading, unloading and reloading in improving poor subsoil through pre-compression loading construction method and, for this purpose, examined the characteristics of the consolidation of Kunsan clay through incremental loading test (IL) using standard consolidation tester and constant loading rate test (CLR), which were adapted from the constant rate of strain test (CRS). In addition, after CRS test, this study determined the characteristics of secondary consolidation and relationships among void ratio, effective stress and time according to the ratio of effective over-consolidation on reloading at the point of time of random expansion. Kunsan clay had larger expansion and smaller secondary consolidation settlement when the ratio of effective over-consolidation was high. In addition, when loading was applied after the load was removed at once, the secondary consolidation coefficient $C'_{\alpha}$ was smaller than that when the load was removed gradually, and when the ratio of effective over-consolidation was over 1.4 a similar value was produced. Based on the entire settlement resulting from reloading, the secondary consolidation coefficient $C"_{\alpha}$ increased non-linearly with the lapse of time but the final value was similar to that in the case of rapid removal. The strain velocity of void ratio was in a regular linear relationship with the increase of loading time regardless of the ratio of effective over-consolidation in both tests and it grew smaller with the increase of the ratio of effective over-consolidation.tion.

• Tunnel and Underground Space
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• v.31 no.5
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• pp.333-359
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• 2021

Gases such as hydrogen and radon can be generated around the canister in high-level radioactive waste disposal systems due to several reasons including the corrosion of metal materials. When the gas generation rate exceeds the gas diffusion rate in the low-permeability bentonite buffer, the gas phase will form and accumulate in the engineered barrier system. If the gas pressure exceeds the gas entry pressure, gas can migrate into the bentonite buffer, resulting in pathway dilation flow and advective flow. Because a sudden occurrence of dilation flow can cause radionuclide leakage out of the engineered barrier of the radioactive waste disposal system, it is necessary to understand the gas migration behavior in the bentonite buffer to quantitatively evaluate the long-term safety of the engineered barrier. Experimental research investigating the characteristics of gas migration in saturated bentonite and research developing numerical models capable of simulating such behaviors are being actively conducted worldwide. In this technical note, previous gas injection experiments and the numerical models proposed to verify such behaviors are introduced, and the future challenges necessary for the investigation of gas migration are summarized.

• Economic and Environmental Geology
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• v.55 no.5
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• pp.497-510
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• 2022

Monthly monitoring, 3D scan survey, and electrical resistivity survey were conducted from January 2018 to August 2022 to identify the cause of rockfall occurring in Daljeon-ri Columnar Joint (Natural Monument No. 415), Pohang. A total of 3,231 rocks fell from the columnar joint over the past 5 years, and 1,521 (47%) of the falling rocks were below 20 cm in length, 978 (30.3%) of 20-30 cm, and 732 (22.7%) of rocks over 30 cm. While the number of rockfalls by year has decreased since 2018, the frequency of rockfalls bigger than 30 cm tends to increase. Large-scale rockfalls occurred mainly during the thawing season (March-April) and the rainy season (June-July), and the analysis of the relationship between cumulative rainfall and rockfall occurrence showed that cumulative rainfall for 3 to 4 days is also closely related to the occurrence of rockfall. Smectite and illite, which are expansible clay minerals, were observed in XRD analysis of the slope material (filling minerals) in the columnar joint, and the presence of a fault fracture zone was confirmed in the electrical resistivity survey. In addition, the confirmed fault fracture zone and the maximum erosion point analyzed through 3D precision measurement coincided with the main rockfall occurrence point observed by the BTC-6PXD camera. Therefore, the main cause of rockfall at Daljeon-ri columnar joint in Pohang is a combination of internal factors (development of fault fracture zones and joints, weathering of rocks, presence of expansive clay minerals) and external factors (precipitation, rapid thawing phenomenon), resulting in large-scale rockfall. Meanwhile, it was also confirmed that the Pohang-Gyeongju earthquake, which was continuously raised, was not the main cause.

• Journal of the Mineralogical Society of Korea
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• v.27 no.4
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• pp.293-299
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• 2014

The bentonite, a buffer material, is essential for the deep geological disposal of HLW (high-level radioactive waste), and it is important to know its characteristic long-term evolution in the underground environment. With an assumption that the concentration of aqueous copper ions will increase if copper-coated materials on a metal canister are corroded, we examined some characteristic ion-exchanges and cation release phenomena occurring in the bentonite clay (montmorillonite) interacted with aqueous Cu cations. During the interaction between dissolved copper and bentonite, Na rather than Ca cations in the expandable clay were preferentially replaced by Cu ions in the experiment. In addition, the Cu-exchanged montmorillonite was characterized by an asymmetric X-ray diffracted pattern with relatively collapsed interlayers compared to the raw sample. These results indicate that the gradual change of the original bentonite property may occur in a underground disposal condition. We are going to further study the characteristic chemical and mineralogical changes of the bentonite buffer to be used for the disposal site by conducting additional experiments.

• Journal of the Korean Geotechnical Society
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• v.27 no.9
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• pp.47-53
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• 2011

Marine dredged soils taken from navigation channels or construction sites of coastal area usually have a lot of salt in pores of clayey soils. This paper investigates effect of salt on mechanical characteristics of non-salt and salt-rich stabilized dredged soil. The stabilized dredged soil (SDS) consisted of dredged soil and cement. Several pairs of SDS with non-salt and salt-rich dredged soils, noted as N-SDS and S-SDS, respectively, were prepared to compare their strengths and compressibility characteristics. The microstructures, strength and compressibility characteristics of N-SDS and S-SDS specimens at 7 and 28 days of curing time were evaluated using scanning electronic microscope (SEM), unconfined compression test, and oedometer test. It was found that salt concentration of clayey soil affected not only the formation of soil structure but also the strength development of mixture. The compression index and swelling index of S-SDS were also greater than those of N-SDS, which indicated that the compressibility of mixture increased due to salt concentration. Salinity in clayey soil had a negative effect on the strength development and compressibility characteristics of stabilized dredged soils.

• Journal of the Korean Geotechnical Society
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• v.20 no.7
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• pp.99-105
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• 2004

When a saturated clay is sampled from a borehole in an undisturbed manner, the exerted negative pore water pressure restricts the volume expansion. The vertical and horizontal stresses to which the clay was subjected in the ground are smaller and larger than this isotropically confining stress equivalent to the mean principal stress in the ground, respectively. Therefore the sample expands vertically and shrinks laterally under an undrained condition. In the ordinary consolidation test, the sample thus deformed is trimmed to fit the inside of the consolidometer ring. Thus, the specimen generates larger consolidation displacement due to confining larger horizontal stress when in-situ effective pressure is loaded. The specimen does not reproduce the in-situ consolidation behavior, In this paper, considering sample deformation, the test specimen is made to expand laterally to fit the inside of the ring in the undrained manner when the in-situ effective pressure is loaded. And applicability of this proposed test procedure was verified; results from the conventional consolidation test procedure are also discussed.

• Journal of the Korean Geotechnical Society
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• v.15 no.3
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• pp.71-81
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• 1999

A study on the undrained behavior of isotropically consolidated clay-sand mixtures was carried out using the automated triaxial testing apparatus. Overconsolidated ratio, effective mean pressure and clay content( up to 20% bentonite) were the factors varied in the experimental investigation. Undrained behavior(strength and pore water pressure generation during shear in triaxial loading) depends upon overconsolidation ratio, confining pressure and clay content. Significant changes in undrained compression characteristics occurred at around 20% of clay contents in the sand. The test results were analyzed and their behaviors were interpreted within the framework of plasticity constitutive model for clay-sand mixtures. Possible physical bases for the proposed forms are discussed. Validation of the applied model using the laboratory results is also given.