Study on resistance to deformation of artificially frozen soil in deep alluvium

The resistance to deformation of artificially frozen soils in deep alluvium is investigated by relation between the secant Young’s modulus and the axial strain for different type of soil, loading or unloading, frozen temperature and initial confining pressure. It is observed that the stress-strain behavior of frozen soils in deep alluvium is highly nonlinear and the secant Young’s modulus might decrease with increasing strain, the limit of the elastic stage appeared similar for all conditions and was approximately 0.05% axial strain. On the other hand, the secant Young’s modulus of studied frozen soils and its degradation was closely related to the type of soils, loading or unloading, frozen temperature and initial confining pressure. Results indicate that the factors which can increase the secant Young’s modulus before yield of frozen soils would accelerates the rate of degradation of the secant Young’s modulus after yield of frozen soils.