Resilient Modulus of Unsaturated Soil – A Comprehensive Review

Abstract

Unsaturated soils are predominant in semi-arid regions which has the property to show moisture changes. Compacted pavement soil is in the unsaturated state thus exhibiting the tendency to weaken or strengthen with varying water content. With ever-changing vehicular loading condition, the necessity to utilize the dynamic behavior of pavement materials in the design of pavements have been validated in numerous research works. Thus the elastic moduli of pavement material have been incorporated as a key parameter in MEPDG. In-service condition all the compacted soil possess the ability to exhibit changes in strength with seasonal moisture variation. This paper is intended to summarize the findings and the necessity to understand the post-compaction moisture variation and their influence on the mechanical property of pavement materials. Furthermore, the importance to correlate suction and resilient modulus have not been into practice in many developing countries due to inadequate information. Hence, the present work aims to be a comprehensive reference to be updated on available correlation models.