Geotechnical engineering
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Geotechnical engineering is the field of engineering concerned with earth materials, such as soils and rocks.
Soil mechanics
Soil mechanics is a key area of geotechnical engineering. Soils are made up of solid rock or mineral particles, water, and air. These three are known as the phases of soil. There are a number of standard properties of soil which are used in geotechnical engineering:
- Unit weight: the weight of a unit volume of soil.
- Voids ratio: the ratio of the volume of voids (Vv) to the volume of solids (Vs).
- Porosity: the ratio of the volume of voids (Vv) to the volume of the soil.
- Shear strength: the shear stress which causes the soil to fail.