5. Laboratory/Scaled Geophysics
Construction of a Reference Geophysical Testing Site on Soft Clays
P. H. Giao and C. Vichailai
School of Engineering and Technology, Asian Institute of Technology, Thailand.
Abstract
A reference geophysical site has both academic and industrial values. There are only a few geophysical testing that were constructed in the world, and no site has been developed on a soft clay ground. Construction of such a site in the campus of the Asian Institute of Technology (AIT) was proposed as the compund has very suitable conditions in term of sufficient space, good protecting conditions and easiness of excavation and burial of the geo-objects. The purposes of development of a Geophysical Testing Site are: (i) to provide targets suitable for near-surface geophysical methods such as magnetic, electric, electromagnetic, seismic and radar.; (ii) to provide some simple targets for training purposes and teaching of engineering geophysical classes; (iii) to provide a series of more challenging targets which would test the limits of present equipment resolution and field techniques; (iv) to provide targets for various research works e.g. detection of some materials which are of practical importance, but are currently undetectable. In this study, the methods of construction and the initial results of testing and modeling obtained will be presented. Development of a complete geophysical site would require a lot of works in successive phases, and this study can be seen as an initial one. A successful development of such a geophysical site would have a long-term impact in promoting applications of engineering and environmental geophysics for Thailand and in the SE Asian region, where the role of geophysics is increasingly not only for exploration of mineral resources, development of engineering infrastructure, but also for disaster mitigation and alleviation.
Last modified: Fri Mar 31 18:18:29 2006