PhD student Noor Laham attends ALERT Geomaterials Workshop and Doctoral School in Aussois
It was a great pleasure and rewarding experience to attend the 32nd ALERT Geomaterials Workshop and Doctoral school held from the 27th of September to the 2nd of October in the French Alps, Aussois. I had the opportunity to meet new people and build relationships with other researchers in my field of study. One thing I liked is seeing people who have written papers that I have read and created models that I work on. I found it inspiring to have discussions with people working on a specific area that is similar to what I do or even complements my work. There is always something new to learn and it is quite important to see what is new in the field and what are the current topics.
During the Doctoral School on ‘Constitutive Modelling in Geomaterials’, I found myself in the right position to learn and acquire knowledge from experts to support my PhD study. Attending this event provided an excellent platform for my professional development and personal fulfilments. Not to forget enjoying hiking in Aussois’s magical mountains!
The workshop covered important geotechnical aspects such as geomechanics-driven models used for forecasting ground movements, machine learning role to bypass some of the current limitations of several experimental and numerical methods in the field of solid mechanics and bridging the gap between experiments and modelling from laboratory testing to material models prediction. Generally, the workshop highlighted current geotechnical challenges and the ways and methods to overcome these.
The doctoral school covered constitutive modelling concepts where fundamentals of constitutive modelling were introduced from basic elastic and elasto-plastic models to more advanced frameworks of hardening plasticity, bounding surface plasticity and hypoplasticity. More advanced topics were presented in detail such as simulation of small strain stiffness and cyclic loading, modelling unsaturated soils, meta-stable structures and time and rate dependence. An impressive closure session covered topics on numerical implementation of constitutive models, macro-modelling and hands on calibrations. To mention some of the experts in the field that presented in the school: Professors Claudio Tamagnini, David Masin, Claudio di Prisco, Cristina Jommi and others, where they shared their knowledge and years of experience in constitutive modelling and opened sophisticated geotechnical discussions that inspired a lot of minds attending the event, including myself.
Find out more about ALERT here .