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Soil, also commonly referred to as earth, is a mixture of organic matter, minerals, gases, liquids, and organisms that together support life of plants and soil organisms. Some scientific definitions distinguish dirt from soil by restricting the former term specifically to displaced soil. Soil consists of a solid phase of minerals and organic matter (the soil matrix), as well as a porous phase that holds gases (the soil atmosphere) and water (the soil solution). Accordingly, soil is a three-state system of solids, liquids, and gases.
The finite element method (FEM) is a popular method for numerically solving differential equations arising in engineering and mathematical modeling. Typical problem areas of interest include the traditional fields of structural analysis, heat transfer, fluid flow, mass transport, and electromagnetic potential. The FEM is a general numerical method for solving partial differential equations in two or three space variables (i.e., some boundary value problems).
Water content or moisture content is the quantity of water contained in a material, such as soil (called soil moisture), rock, ceramics, crops, or wood. Water content is used in a wide range of scientific and technical areas, and is expressed as a ratio, which can range from 0 (completely dry) to the value of the materials' porosity at saturation. It can be given on a volumetric or mass (gravimetric) basis. Volumetric water content, θ, is defined mathematically as: where is the volume of water and is equal to the total volume of the wet material, i.
Analysis of macroscopic desiccation shrinkage experiments indicates that most, but not all of the shrinkage during drying occurs while soil is still saturated. Shrinkage practically ceases and air sta
Mechanisms of free-shrinkage strains of desiccating deformable initially saturated soils are studied. The role of the surface evaporation rate, surface tension and viscosity of pore fluid, and soil co
A meso-scale model based on the evolution of the pore system and idealized as bimodal is numerically examined. A simplified evolution of the model reveals a series of characteristics that qualitativel