Evaluation of Creep Behavior of Soft Soils by Utilizing Multisensor Data Combined with Machine Learning

Abstract

To identify the unknown values of the parameters of Burger’s constitutive law, commonly used for the evaluation of the creep behavior of the soft soils, this paper demonstrates a procedure relying on the data obtained from multiple sensors, where each sensor is used to its best advantage. The geophysical, geotechnical, and unmanned aerial vehicle data are used for the development of a numerical model whose results feed into the custom-architecture neural network, which then provides information about on the complex relationships between the creep characteristics and soil displacements. By utilizing InSAR and GPS monitoring data, particle swarm algorithm identifies the most probable set of Burger’s creep parameters, eventually providing a reliable estimation of the long-term behavior of soft soils. The validation of methodology is conducted for the Oostmolendijk embankment in the Netherlands, constructed on the soft clay and peat layers. The validation results show that the application of the proposed methodology, which relies on multisensor data, can overcome the high cost and long duration issues of laboratory tests for the determination of the creep parameters and can provide reliable estimates of the long-term behavior of geotechnical structures constructed on soft soils.