The Influence of Changes in Water Content on the Electrical Resistivity of a Natural Unsaturated Loess

Abstract

Non-destructive methods of measuring water content in soils have been extensively developed in the last decades, especially in soil science. Among these methods, the measurements based on the electrical resistivity are simple and reliable thanks to the clear relationship between the water content and the electrical resistivity of soils. In this work, a new electrical resistivity probe was developed to monitor the change in local water content in the triaxial apparatus. The probe is composed of two-pair of electrodes, and an electrical current is induced through the soil at the vicinity of the contact between the probe and the specimen. Some experimental data on the changes in resistivity with the degree of saturation were obtained in specimens of a natural unsaturated loess from Northern France. Two theoretical models of resistivity were also used to analyze the obtained data. Results are finally discussed with respect to the loess’s water retention properties.

Effect of Wetting‐Drying Cycles on Mechanical Behaviour and Electrical Resistivity of Unsaturated Subgrade Soil

“…Taking advantage of convenient operation and relative low cost, electrical resistivity is largely used to study the soil behaviour [17][18][19][20][21]. e electrical resistivity of unsaturated soil is primarily determined by material composition, structures, and characteristics of pore fluid in soil [22,23].…”

Integration of ERT and shallow seismic refraction for geotechnical investigation on El-Alamein Hotel Building Area, El-Alamein new city, Egypt

“…Saline water typically has an extremely low resistivity, averaging around 0.2 Ohms.m (Nowroozi et al 1999;Rao et al 2011), whereas the resistivities of sand saturated with a saltwater range from 8 to 50 Ω.m (Adepelumi et al 2009;Kouzana and Benassi 2010;McInnis et al 2013;Basheer et al 2014;Basheer and Salama 2022). Silty sand that is a mixture of both granular and fine particles has lower electrical resistivity than dry sand that has exceedingly high resistivity (Fukue et al 1999;Munoz-Castelblanco et al 2012) because the grain size fraction can affect the ease of current propagation inside each geomaterial, with fine particles allowing current to flow easily and producing low resistivity values and coarse grains providing high resistivity values due to the difficulty of current propagation (Abidin et al 2012). Consequently, the resistivity shows a sharp reduction even with a little raise in water content (Archie 1942;Gupta and Hanks 1972;McCarter 1984;Kalinski and Kelly 1993;Yan et al 2012).…”

Experimental study on damage of slope under drying and wetting cycle based on DC electric method

“…With the process of rainfall and seepage, cracks in slope form in the cycle of water absorption expansion and water loss contraction, which destroy the integrity of the original structure. At the same time, it also provide good channel for water infiltration, result in the formation of saturated ponding area in slope [6,7]. Water cause the increase of slope weight and the decrease of slope strength, and may lead to the instability and failure of slope [8][9][10].…”