Newcastle University

Introduction

Dr Rouainia has been a member of academic staff in the the Geotechnical and Structural Engineering (GEST) Group in the School since 2003. His research interests focus on the development and implementation of multi-surface soil plasticity models capable of modelling nonlinear cyclic loading (with applications in renewable energy foundations effects of current and future climate scenarios on infrastructure slopes etc.). Geomechanics and fluid  flow processes in unsaturated soils/rocks have been a major focus of recent work (with applications in gas shales, CCS and ground source energy). His teaching focuses on geotechnics, soil modelling and numerical methods for civil engineers and engineering geologists.

Qualifications

Dipl.-Ing in Civil Engineering
MSc Geotechnical Engineering
Ph.D in Computational Geomechanics

Roles and Resposibilities

GEST Postgraduate PGR Selector
School Coordinator of the International Exchange Programmes (Erasmus)
Coordinator for the Geotechnical Engineering Lab

Memberships

Member of the Geotechnique Advisory Panel (GAP)

Member of NAFEMS Geotechnical Committee.
Member of Northern Geotechnical Group (NGG) Committee.
Chairman of the Association of Computational Mechanics in Engineering - UK, 2008-2009.
Vice-Chairman of the Association of Computational Mechanics in Engineering - UK, 2007-2008.

Industrial Relevance

Small strain modelling of excavations and tunnels
Offshore wind turbine foundations
Soil/pipe interaction
Software consultancy services 

Research Interests

My research interests and expertise currently encompass the following areas: (i) the development of advanced kinematic hardening models for natural soils and routine use of such models in geotechnical problems; (ii) the implementation of robust numerical integration schemes for the integration of advanced soil constitutive relations; (iii) the assessment of climate change effects on embankment slopes; (iv)  the long term cyclic performance of offshore foundations and feasibility of novel foundation solutions and (vi) the development of seismic performance based design methods for geotechnical systems.

Postgraduate Supervision

Jing-Rui Peng - Behaviour of finned piles in sand under lateral loading (completed 2005)
Mahdi Alyami  - Seismic behaviour of gravity quay walls built on liquefiable soils (Completed 2008)
Salah Hamuda - The relation between soil compaction and its thermal characterisation (completed 2009)
Owen Davies - Numerical analysis of the effects of climate change on slope stability (completed 2010)
Ulf Boeker - Petrophysical and geological characterisation of shale reservoirs (completed 2011)
Stylianos Panayides - Application of kinematic hardening structure models to geotechnical problems
Abdulbaset Alterimi - Thermal conductivity of pfa for geothermal applications
Gerardo Gonzalez - Modelling carbon capture and storage in voids created by underground coal gasification
Michael Drews -  Lithological and petrophysical variability of fine-grained sediments
David Simpson - Advanced laboratory characterisation of soft rock
Paul Sargent -  The use for sustainable materials in soil stabilisation  

I am always interested in discussing opportunities for postgraduate study in all areas of my research interest but I am also open to discussing other potential projects.  Funding can be secured from a variety of sources, including an annual competition for research council funding.

Esteem indicators

Visiting Research Fellow at the USQ, Australia
Visiting scholar at the University of Newcastle, Australia

Invited lectures

- Northern Geotechnical Group Annual seminar: Invited Speaker - A case study of destructuration effects on the performance of a trial embankment, Newcastle, 20 June 2013.

- Symposium on Modelling of granular materials: problems and solutions? The influence of degradation of structure on the behaviour of a full scale embankment, University of Dundee, 6th August. 2010.
- International Workshop on Geoenvironmental Engineering, Numerical modeling (relevant to EKG applications): State-of-the-art in UK research and practice, Wuhan, China, 16 March 2009.
- Workshop on numerical modelling in geomechanics, Seismic behaviour of gravity quay walls, Newcastle, UK, 24 April 2009.
- Seminario de Geotecnica, Constitutive model for unsaturated soils with structure degradation, Universitat Politecnica de Catalunya, Barcelona, Spain, 5th July 2008.
- Seminar on Geotechnics 2020, Northern Geotechnical Group (NGG), Newcastle, 29th January 2008.
- 5th Annual BGA Conference, Constitutive model for anisotropy and destructuration of natural clays, Westminster, London, 13th June 2007.
- Invited Panel Presentation, Structure and anisotropy of natural soils, 16th Int. Conf. on Soil Mech. and Geotech. Eng., Osaka, Japan, 12th September 2005.
- European Plaxis users meeting, Finite element modelling of small strain soil behaviour, Karlsruhe, Germany, 11th November 2004.  

Funding

Current/Recent Grants

EPSRC Small Equipment Grant - £10k - 2012

GeoPOP - Pore pressure and its prediction in clastic sedimentary rock. Industry funded, £550,000. PI with Andrew Aplin. 20012 – 2015.

GASH (Shale Gas Europe). Industry funded, £400,000. Co-PI with Andrew Aplin. 2009 – 2012.

Shale Gas Canada. Industry funded, £500,000, 2008-2011, Co-PI with Calgary.

BIONICS - EPSRC funded, £125,000. Co-PI with Stephanie Glendenning, 2004-2009.

Soft rock behaviour. Buro Happold, £30,000. PI 2010-2013.

Anisotropy and destructuration of natural clays – EPSRC funded, £125,000. PI 2004-2007.

Undergraduate Teaching

Principles of soil mechanics for civil engineers.

Module leader for:
CEG2201 Geotechnics

Contributions to:
CEG1201 Geotechnical Properties of Soils and Rocks

Erasmus Coordinator 

Postgraduate Teaching

Geomechanics and numerical analysis of geotechnical structures for geotechnical engineers and engineering geologists.

Module leader for:
CEG8201 Geomechanics
CEG8205 Soil Modelling and Numerical Methods 

Contributions to:
MAR8057 - Civil and geotechnical aspects of pipeline engineering

• Elia G, Rouainia M. Seismic performance of an earth embankment using simple and advanced numerical approaches. Journal of Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering 2013, 139(7), 1115-1129.
• Gonzalez NA, Rouainia M, Arroyo M, Gens A. Analysis of tunnel excavation in London Clay incorporating soil structure. Géotechnique 2012, 62(12), 1095-1109.
• Panayides S, Rouainia M, Wood DM. Influence of degradation of structure on the behaviour of a full-scale embankment. Canadian Geotechnical Journal 2012, 49(3), 344-356.
• Al Qadad A, Shahrour I, Rouainia M. Influence of the soil-atmosphere exchange on the hydric profile induced in soil-structure system. Natural Hazards and Earth System Sciences 2012, 12(6), 2039-2049.
• Rouainia M, Elia G. Performance based seismic design of an earth dam in Southern Italy. In: Second International Conference on Performance Based Design in Earthquake Geotechnical Engineering. 2012, Taormina, Italy: Patron Editore Bologna.
• Kaidi S, Rouainia M, Ouahcine A. Stability of breakwaters under hydrodynamic loading using a coupledDDA/FEM approach. Ocean Engineering 2012, 55, 62-70.
• Osman A, Rouainia M. Dynamic response of an axially loaded rigid sphere embedded in a saturated poroelastic medium. Archive of Applied Mechanics 2011, 82(3), 407-421.
• Peng G, Clarke BG, Rouainia M. Increasing the resistance of piles subject to cyclic lateral loading. Journal of Geotechnical and Geo-environmental Engineering 2011, 137(10), 977.
• González NA, Gens A, Arroyo M, Rouainia M. Modelling the behaviour of structured London Clay. In: Firth International Symposium on Deformation Characteristics of Geomaterials. 2011, Seoul, Korea.
• Kaidi S, Ouahsine A, Rouainia M. DDA in fluid-structure problems for the study of gravity dam failure. European Journal of Computational Mechanics 2010, 19(5-7), 533-546.
• Hamuda S, Clarke BG, Rouainia M. Effective thermal conductivity of partially saturated soils. In: Fifth International Conference on Unsaturated Soils (UNSAT). 2010, Barcelona, Spain.
• Peng J-R, Rouainia M, Clarke BG. Finite element analysis of laterally loaded fin piles. Computers and Structures 2010, 88(21-22), 1239-1247.
• Rouainia M, Pereira JM. Modelling the unsaturated behaviour of structured soils. In: Fifth International Conference on Unsaturated Soils (UNSAT). 2010, Barcelona, Spain.
• Elia G, Rouainia M. Numerical analysis of the seismic response of an earth embankment. In: 18th UK Conference on Computational Mechanics (ACME-UK). 2010, Southampton, UK.
• Panyides S, Rouainia M, Osman AS. Ultimate capacity of suction anchors using an advancedconstitutive model. In: Second International Symposium on Frontiers in Offshore Geotechnics (ISFOG). 2010, Perth, Australia.
• Alyami M, Rouainia M, Wilkinson SM. Numerical analysis of deformation behaviour of quay walls under earthquake loading. Soil Dynamics and Earthquake Engineering 2009, 29(3), 525-536.
• Rouainia M, Davies O, O'Brien T, Glendinning S. Numerical modelling of climate effects on slope stability. Proceedings of the Institution of Civil Engineers - Engineering Sustainability 2009, 162(2), 81-89.
• Hiley RA, Rouainia M. Explicit Runge-Kutta methods for the integration of rate-type constitutive equations. Computational Mechanics 2008, 42(1), 53-66.
• Davies OC, Rouainia M, Glendinning S. Numerical predictions of seasonal pore water pressure fluctuations using FLAC tp flow. In: Unsaturated Soils. Advances in Geo-Engineering: proceedings of the 1st European Conference on Unsaturated Soils. 2008, Durham, United Kingdom: London: Taylor & Francis Ltd.
• Peng J, Clarke B, Rouainia M. A device to cyclic lateral loaded model piles. Geotechnical Testing Journal 2006, 29(4), 341-347.
• Rouainia M, Muir Wood D. Computational aspects in finite strain plasticity analysis of geotechnical materials. Mechanics Research Communications 2006, 33(2), 123-133.
• Rouainia M, Lewis H, Pearce C, Bicanic N, Couples GD, Reynolds MA. Hydro-geomechanical modelling of seal behaviour in overpressured basins using discontinuous deformation analysis. Engineering Geology 2006, 82(4), 222-233.
• Zhao J, Sheng D, Rouainia M, Sloan SW. Explicit stress integration of complex soil models. International Journal for Numerical and Analytical Methods in Geomechanics 2005, 29(12), 1209-1229.
• Peng J, Rouainia M, Clarke BG. Lateral resistance of finned piles established from cyclic model tests. Journal of Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering, ASCE 2005.
• Hiley RA, Rouainia M. Simple elastoplasticity for natural clays. In: COMPLAS 2005: VIII International Conference on Computational Plasticity. 2005, Barcelona, Spain: International Center for Numerical Methods in Engineering (CIMNE).
• Couples GD, Lewis H, Reynolds MA, Pickup GE, Ma J, Rouainia M, Bicanic N, Pearce CJ. Upscaling Fluid-Flow and Geomechanical Properties in Coupled Matrix+Fractures+Fluids Systems. In: SPE Reservoir Simulation Symposium Proceedings. 2003, Houston, Texas: Society of Petroleum Engineers.
• Rouainia M, Muir Wood D. Implicit numerical integration for a kinematic hardening soil plasticity model. International Journal for Numerical and Analytical Methods in Geomechanics 2001, 25(13), 1305-1325.
• Rouainia M, Muir Wood D. An implicit constitutive algorithm for finite strain Cam-clay elasto-plastic model. Mechanics of Cohesive-Frictional Materials 2000, 5(6), 469-489.
• Rouainia M, Muir Wood D. A kinematic hardening constitutive model for natural clays with loss of structure. Geotechnique 1999, 50(2), 153-164.
• Rouainia M, Peric D. A Computational model for elasto-plastic viscoplastic solids at finite strain with reference to thin shell applications. International Journal for Numerical Methods in Engineering 1998, 42(2), 289-311.