PSOslope: A stand-alone windows application for graphical analysis of slope stability

Abstract

Landslide is an increasing problem and a cause for concern in densely populated areas. In addition to field studies and laboratory experiments, engineers also embrace computer technology to find better solutions and to achieve better landslide analysis. Traditionally, the main analysis framework is the limit equilibrium analysis, in which the state of limit equilibrium in the target slope is assumed to be reached along the entire sliding surface at the same time of failure. However, the assumption of circular sliding surfaces would prevent the search of non-circular sliding surfaces with lower factors of safety. To address this problem, particle swarm optimization (PSO) is implemented in this study using a computer program written in C# to automatically discover the optimal results in the target function. The results show that the PSO-based approach offers many interesting outcomes. © 2011 Springer-Verlag.