Simulação e caracterização de corridas de detritos através do Método dos Elementos Discretos

Abstract

The mass movements are quite common geomorphologic processes in nature. These may be defined as mixture flows between fluid and granular material, with free upper surfaces (exposed to air) which are governed by gravity. Debris flows can be considered the kind of mass movement of most interest of researchers’ study due to the high frequency of occurrence of the movement, the destructive power inherent and the very peculiar characteristics, which differs from others phenomena. Debris flows are unpredictable phenomena in their occurrence, fast and carry great human and financial losses. The simulation and the characterization of this phenomenon have been studied for researchers from several countries due to the complexity and the little understanding of the adjacent mechanisms of the process. In this context, this paper proposes the simulation of debris flow using the Discrete Element Method (DEM). The main purpose of these simulations is to investigate and to characterize the behavior of debris flow through the characterization parameters according to the variation of some parameters of the model of debris flow. To this aim, we study the calibration of some parameters of the DEM so the simulation effectively of the debris flows to be possible, overcoming the difficulties reported in the literature. Among these difficulties, there is the quantification of the effects of the interactions between the particles and interstitial fluid. Therefore, we develop the methodologies for the simulation of the cohesive contacts between the grains, for the simulation of the interstitial fluid and to calculate the characterization parameters. Thus, we study the variation of the behavior of the characterization parameters of the debris flows by varying the percentage amount of the interstitial fluid.