This thesis proposes an elasto-plastic constitutive model suitable for earth materials. The constitutive model is formulated to be satisfied with flexibility and stability by adopting the advantages of the existing models for soils.
Typically, the finite element solution to the nonlinear elasto-plastic problem is achieved by Newton's method in which a sequence of linear problem approximating the rate-constitutive equations is solved. To preserve the quadratic convergence of a linear problem, the so-called return mapping algorithm with consistent tangent operator provides an effective and robust integration scheme to the rate constitutive equation of the propose model.
As an illustrative examples, the behavior of the constitutive model under stress controlled triaxial test conditions is examined and correlated with experimental data of saturated Han-River sand and normally consolidated clay.
