Teaching

Teaching & supervision

Graduate courses in computational and theoretical geomechanics, postgraduate thesis supervision, and openly shared lecture notes on numerical methods for geotechnical engineering.

Graduate courses

Designed and taught as visiting graduate faculty at Addis Ababa Science and Technology University (AASTU), Department of Civil Engineering, between 2017 and 2023. Each was delivered as an intensive block course, condensed into a few concentrated weeks during visits to Addis Ababa, with full lecture notes, slides, runnable code, and exercises.

Advanced Computational Methods in Geotechnical Engineering

CENG6202 · MSc · 2017, 2019

Introduces advanced numerical methods with a focus on practical geotechnical applications: from the mathematical foundations, through the finite difference and finite element methods, to hands-on finite element modelling of real soil–structure problems and an outlook on hybrid methods. Assessment combined programming assignments with a written exam.

Syllabus

  1. Geotechnical analysis: analysis and design requirements, theoretical considerations, idealised computational domains, analysis methods
  2. Mathematical preliminaries: vectors, matrices, and linear systems of equations
  3. The finite difference method: one-dimensional consolidation and two-dimensional steady-state groundwater flow
  4. The finite element method: discretisation, shape functions, element formulation and assembly; constitutive models (linear elasticity, Mohr–Coulomb, Modified Cam-Clay); numerical simulations
  5. Introduction to hybrid methods: boundary element, discrete element, and coupled methods

Constitutive Modelling in Geomechanics

Graduate course · 2023

A graduate course on the mechanical behaviour of soils and the theory behind the constitutive models used in geotechnical simulation: building from continuum-mechanics foundations through elasticity and elasto-plasticity to critical-state soil mechanics. Supported by tensor-analysis and stress-state exercises and a written assignment comparing soil models and their implementation in finite element software.

Syllabus

  1. Introduction: soil behaviour and boundary value problems; why constitutive models are needed; the oedometer and triaxial tests
  2. Continuum mechanics: tensors and indicial notation; stress and strain tensors, principal values, and deviatoric, octahedral and invariant measures
  3. Soil behaviour: the triaxial stress–strain space; yield, hardening, dilatancy, failure, and the critical state
  4. Elastic response: Hooke’s law and the elastic constants; isotropy, anisotropy, cross-anisotropy, and hyperelasticity
  5. Plastic response I: failure criteria (Mohr–Coulomb, Drucker–Prager, Tresca, von Mises, Matsuoka–Nakai); plastic flow, consistency, normality and the associated flow rule
  6. Plastic response II: dilatancy and non-associated flow; strain hardening and softening; hardening rules and an outlook to cap, critical-state (Cam-Clay) and bounding-surface models

Lecture notes & worked examples

Selected material from these courses, written up as standalone notes with runnable code.

  1. Failure Criteria in Geomechanics and the Deviatoric Plane

    An excerpt from the lecture notes of a course I taught entitled Constitutive Modelling in Geomechanics. A failure criterion defines the surface in stress space that bounds the states a soil can sustain. This note compares...

    constitutive modelling · plasticity · failure criteria · Mohr-Coulomb · Drucker-Prager · geomechanics

  2. Stress Invariants and the Deviatoric Stress Tensor

    An excerpt from the lecture notes of a course I taught entitled Constitutive Modelling in Geomechanics. Stress invariants are the natural language of soil constitutive models, which must be independent of the chosen coordinate system. This...

    constitutive modelling · continuum mechanics · stress invariants · deviatoric stress · geomechanics

  3. Iterative Solvers for Linear Systems: Jacobi, Gauss-Seidel and SOR

    A worked example from the lecture notes of a course I taught entitled Advanced Computational Methods in Geotechnical Engineering. The finite difference and finite element methods both reduce a problem to a linear system; for the...

    iterative methods · linear systems · Jacobi · Gauss-Seidel · SOR · numerical methods · geotechnical engineering

  4. Finite Difference Method for Two-Dimensional Groundwater Flow

    Code and excerpt from lecture notes demonstrating application of the finite difference method (FDM) to steady-state flow in two dimensions. The extracted lecture note is taken from a course I taught entitled Advanced Computational Methods in...

    finite difference · groundwater flow · numerical methods · FDM · geotechnical engineering

  5. Finite Difference Method for One-Dimensional Consolidation

    Code and excerpt from lecture notes demonstrating application of the finite difference method (FDM) to one-dimensional consolidation. The extracted lecture note is taken from a course I taught entitled Advanced Computational Methods in Geotechnical Engineering.

    finite difference · consolidation · numerical methods · FDM · geotechnical engineering