A Study on the Unstable Evolution Characteristics of Loose Particle Slopes under Dynamic Supply of Material Sources

Abstract

The instability of granular slopes is one of the typical natural disasters in the cold mountainous areas of Xinjiang, posing significant threats to transportation facilities and pedestrian safety. Dynamic source supply is a major factor inducing the instability and destruction of these slopes. This paper investigates the instability evolution process, morphological changes, and destruction characteristics of granular slopes under continuous and periodic dynamic source supply conditions through physical model experiments and numerical simulations. The results demonstrate that: (i) granular slopes exhibit a "accumulation-instability-accumulation" cyclic evolutionary process with the continuous increase in supply; (ii) the surface slope angle at the middle position of the slope increases with each increase in supply until a steep decline of about 5° occurs after each overall instability event; (iii) under continuous supply, the slope experiences several local instabilities before an overall collapse, and the scale of the overall instability increases with the number of occurrences.