Chapter 12: Introduction to Section 2

Figure 12.1  outlines the layout and contents of Section 2 Fundamental principles.

Section 2 serves as an aide-memoire to the fundamental principles and theories underlying geotechnical engineering, from characterising the ground, through the behaviour of geo-materials to the basic conceptual models used in the analysis and design of geotechnical engineering structures.

The first six chapters (Chapters 13 The ground profile and its genesis to 18 Rock behaviour) are concerned with characterising the ground and the fundamental aspects of material behaviour. Chapter 13 The ground profile and its genesis describes and discusses the development of the ground profile from a geological perspective, and how this knowledge may be used to inform the development of a conceptual ground model for use in geotechnical engineering. Chapter 14 Soils as particulate materials explains the factors that make soil, as a particulate material, fundamentally different from many other civil engineering materials such as steel and concrete.