Soil Slips Versus Flow Failures in Rain-Infiltrated Slopes: Using Mechanical Stability Principles to Enhance Spatially Distributed Models for Landslide Forecasting

该项目的目标是促进基于物理的滑坡预测模型的变革进步。这一目标将通过将土壤稳定性的新概念纳入自然边坡的破坏标准来实现。将特别注意气候强迫和雨水渗透的影响，众所周知，它们会改变水压状况，使土工材料的强度特性恶化，并造成斜坡和土方工程的严重破坏。该项目将使用创新的方法来捕获多种类型的故障（例如，局部滑动或类似流动的不稳定）。这些标准将与土壤表面水文反应的模拟相结合，从而可以预测区域尺度上不稳定地面运动的可能性。该项目将考虑在降雨期间遭受普遍滑坡的景观的具体案例。对于这些情况，我们将为给定的形态特征、岩土特性和水文条件组合生成关键触发扰动的图表。预期的结果是通过基于物理的模拟，制定新的定量方法来控制自然和城市化景观的稳定性演变状态。该项目的研究成果将通过物理建模来提高定位不同类型边坡破坏的能力，从而造福社会。根据场地的具体特征，土壤覆盖物可能以有限流动性的滑动或快速流动的形式失效。世界各地的几个案例已经证明了这些差异的巨大影响，因为快速的山体滑坡可能会造成相当大的财产损失和人命损失。该项目促进的对山坡动态的物理理解将在自然灾害的管理中发挥作用。特别是，将科学发现纳入滑坡预报的做法，可对世界若干地区的风险评估和土地使用规划产生广泛的社会和教育影响。此外，对自然环境下土壤破坏的进一步了解将影响一系列由人类活动与地貌过程之间的相互作用所主导的问题，如土壤侵蚀、沉积物运输和河道管理。教育和外展活动将被整合，以利用该项目的研究组成部分，包括研究生的国际经验和工程和地球科学学生的综合教育活动。

The goal of this project is to contribute to the transformative advancement of physically-based models for landslide forecasting. This objective will be pursued by incorporating novel concepts of soil stability into the failure criteria for natural slopes. Particular attention will be given to the effects of climatic forcing and rain infiltration, which are known to change the water-pressure regime, deteriorate the strength properties of geotechnical materials and cause dramatic failures in slopes and earthworks. The project will use innovative methods to capture multiple types of failure (e.g., localized slips or flow-like instabilities). These criteria will be combined with the simulation of the hydrologic response of soil veneers, thus allowing the prediction of the potential for unstable ground movements at regional scale. The project will consider specific cases of landscapes which have suffered pervasive landsliding during rainfall events. For these cases, we will generate charts of critical triggering perturbations for given combinations of morphologic features, geotechnical properties and hydrologic conditions. The expected outcome is to formulate new quantitative methods to control the evolving state of stability in natural and urbanized landscapes through physically-based simulations.Findings from this project will benefit society by enhancing the ability to locate different types of slope failure via physical modeling. Depending on site-specific features, soil covers can fail either in the form of slides with limited mobility or as rapid flows. Several cases around the world have demonstrated the dramatic implications of these differences, as rapid landslides may involve considerable damages to property and the loss of human lives. The physical understanding of hillslope dynamics fostered by this project will play a role in the management of natural disasters. In particular, the incorporation of scientific findings into the practice of landslide forecasting can have broad societal and educational impacts for risk assessment and land-use planning in several areas of the world. In addition, an improved understanding of soil failure in natural settings will impact a broad range of problems dominated by the interplay between human activities and geomorphic processes, such as soil erosion, sediment transport and river-channel management. Education and outreach initiatives will be integrated to capitalize on the research components of the project, including international experiences for graduate students and an integrated educational initiative for engineering and geoscience students.