On the hydro-mechanical behavior of an unsaturated river embankment: centrifuge testing and numerical analysis

This paper concerns the numerical analysis aimed at reproducing the centrifuge test conducted on a clayey silty sand river embankment, compacted in unsaturated conditions and subjected to a simulated flood event. To investigate the observed behavior during different stages of the test, characterized by incremental acceleration fields, a finite element simulation of the small-scale centrifuge model was developed. An accurate calibration of the hydro-mechanical soil parameters based on a preceding laboratory campaign was used to simulate the centrifuge test. Then, a comparison between the results of numerical simulation and experimental data, collected during centrifuge test, allowed to validate the fully-coupled numerical analysis at the small-scale model and to interpret the hydro-mechanical behavior of the embankment.