Determining Soil-Water Characteristic Curves from Mercury Intrusion Porosimeter Test Data Using Fractal Theory

• Main Authors: Gaoliang Tao, Yin Chen, Henglin Xiao, Qingsheng Chen, Juan Wan
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: MDPI AG 2019-02-01
• Series: Energies
• Subjects: pore size distribution; soil-water characteristic curve; sample scale effect; critical pore size; fractal porous media; air-entry value
• Online Access: https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/12/4/752

Accurate determination of soil-water characteristic curve (SWCC) is of immense importance for understanding the mechanical behavior of unsaturated soils. Due to the difficulty and long duration of experimental procedures, it is of great significance to estimate the SWCC by indirect methods. To address this issue, in this article an effective fractal method is proposed for predicting the SWCC based on mercury intrusion porosimeter (MIP) data. Only two characteristic parameters, namely the fractal dimension and air-entry value, are needed in the presented approach. Detailed procedures for determining the parameters are clearly elaborated. Due to the influence of sample size difference on the equivalent connected pore size, a sample scale effect coefficient is proposed to predict air-entry values. The concept of “critical pore size„ is introduced to obtain the optimal fractal dimension, which can accurately reflect the fractal behaviour of SWCC samples. By comparisons between predicted and experimental SWCCs, the validation of the proposed method is verified. The comparisons reveal the good agreement between the proposed approach and laboratory experiments.