This is a textbook in the course of Soil Mechanics for higher-
school students of civil engineering and hydrotechnical engineering,
and also for students of other specialities associated with construc
tion of engineering structures, such as road constructors, ameliora
tors, geologists, soil scientists.
The Author has made an attempt to write a concise course on the
basis of a wide synthesis of natural sciences and to present the theore
tical data in the most simple and comprehensive form, without
depreciating, however, the general scientific aspect of the problem,
his other aim was to present a number of engineering solutions of
problems in the theory of soil mechanics (calculations of strength,
stability and deformability), which might be widely used in engi
neering.
The book is based on the course of lectures given by the Author
at the Moscow Civil Engineering Institute, his earlier book (Soil
Mechanics, 4th ed., Moscow, Stroiizdat, 1963), and the newest
research works in soil mechanics, both Soviet and foreign, and their
practical applications.
Some problems in the book are discussed from new standpoints
which take into account the principal properties of soils: contact
shear resistance, structure-phase deformability (including creep of
skeleton), compressibility of gas-containing porous water, and the
effect of natural compaction of soils.
The book shows some new methods used for determination of
characteristics of soils and gives some new solutions of the theory
of consolidation and creep of soils, which can be used for predictions
of settlement rates of foundations of structures and their time varia
tions, a separate chapter discusses rheological processes in soils and
their significance.
