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Re-examination of Undrained Strength at

Atterberg Limits Water Contents

H. B. Nagaraj, A. Sridharan &


H. M. Mallikarjuna

Geotechnical and Geological


Engineering
An International Journal

ISSN 0960-3182
Volume 30
Number 4

Geotech Geol Eng (2012) 30:727-736


DOI 10.1007/s10706-011-9489-7

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DOI 10.1007/s10706-011-9489-7

ORIGINAL PAPER

Re-examination of Undrained Strength at Atterberg Limits


Water Contents
H. B. Nagaraj • A. Sridharan •

H. M. Mallikarjuna

Received: 12 August 2011 / Accepted: 27 December 2011 / Published online: 7 January 2012
Ó Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2012

Abstract Most of the testing procedures to deter- variation of undrained strength with water content has
mine liquid limit and plastic limit are strength based been well documented in literature. Thus, uniqueness
with the assumption that, irrespective of the soil type, of strength at liquid limit or plastic limit, which is
the strengths at these limiting water contents are nothing but water holding capacity of soils at different
considered to be unique, being equal to 1.7 and 170 kN/ state of consistencies, is not tenable.
m2, respectively. Based on this, the plastic limit has
been redefined as the water content at which there is a Keywords Clays  Fine-grained soils  Atterberg
100-fold increase in undrained strength as compared to limits  Plasticity  Undrained shear strength
that of liquid limit water content, and the range of water
contents producing this strength variation as the
plasticity index. However, published data from the 1 Introduction
various literature sources clearly show that the varia-
tion of undrained shear strength at the liquid limit water In 1911, Atterberg proposed the limits of consistency
content is observed to be nearly sixty times, and that at for agricultural purposes to get a clear concept of the
plastic limit is more than seventeen times, and hence, range of water contents of a soil in the plastic state
no unique value of undrained strength can be assigned (Casagrande 1932). These limits of consistency
either at the liquid limit or plastic limit of soils. The namely liquid limit (wL) and plastic limit (wP), well
known as Atterberg limits (Casagrande 1932, 1958),
were standardized by Casagrande (1932, 1958) and
H. B. Nagaraj (&) adopted for classification of fine-grained soils. These
Department of Civil Engineering, BMS College
limits are determined using simple tests, which are
of Engineering, Bangalore 560 019, India
e-mail: hbnraj@gmail.com essentially strength based.
Attempts have been made from 1911 onwards to
A. Sridharan understand Atterberg limits better and develop
Indian National Science Academy and Formerly Professor
improved methods of determining the same. Research
of Civil Engineering, Indian Institute of Science,
Bangalore 560 012, India contribution continues to be made on Atterberg limits
e-mail: sridharanasuri@yahoo.com (very recently by Sridharan and Prakash 1998; Sridh-
aran and Nagaraj 1999; Sridharan et al. 2000; Prakash
H. M. Mallikarjuna
and Sridharan 2006; Nagaraj and Sridharan 2010).
Department of Civil Engineering, R.Y.M.E.C,
Bellary 583 104, India Because of the various limitations of the rolling thread
e-mail: malli3765@gmail.com method of determining plastic limit, especially the

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personal errors, attempts have also been made to find the i.e., the water content above which the soil behaves as
same from cone method (e.g. Hansbo 1957; Towner a viscous liquid (i.e., a soil–water mixture with little
1973; Campbell 1976, 1983; Wood and Wroth 1978; measurable shear strength).
Belviso et al. 1985; Sampson and Netterberg 1985;
Wasti and Bezirci 1986; Rao 1987; Harison 1988; Feng 2.1 Discussion on Strength at Liquid Limit Water
2004; Al-Dahlaki and Al-Sharify 2008; Rashid et al. Content
2008; Lee and Freeman 2009; Sivakumar et al. 2009).
Wroth and Wood (1978) have tried to redefine plastic Casagrande (1932, 1958) deduced that the liquid limit
limit in terms of strength as that water content that gives corresponds approximately to a water content at which
a 100-fold increase in shear strength over that at the the soil has shear strength of about 2.5 kPa. Norman
liquid limit. Based on this concept attempts have been (1958) reported shear strength at liquid limit water
made to develop an instrumented cone penetrometer to content ranging from 0.8 to 1.6 kPa for B.S Standard
determine the plastic limit (Stone and Phan 1995). rubber base Casagrande’s apparatus (percussion cup)
Recently Sridharan et al. (1999) have proposed a and 1.1–2.3 kPa for ASTM Standard rubber base
method to determine plastic limit through the correla- Casagrande’s apparatus. Skopek and Ter-stepanian
tion developed between plasticity index and flow index. (1975) have reported shear strength values in the range
In most of the attempts to develop the testing of 1 and 3 kPa at the liquid limit water content in the
procedures to determine liquid limit and plastic limit, percussion cup method. Skempton and Northey (1953)
researchers have tried to define liquid limit and plastic reported shear strength values in the range of
limit as strength based water content, and hence, the 0.7–1.75 kPa.
testing procedures to determine them. However, this Though both the percussion cup method and the
way of defining Atterberg limits deviates from the cone method are basically strength tests, the undrained
basic physical meaning, which is the water holding shear strengths at liquid limit water contents obtained
capacity of the soil at those states of consistency. by either of the two methods are quite varied (Houlsby
Lambe and Whitman (1979) related Atterberg limits 1982). The undrained shear strengths observed at
for a soil to the amount of water attracted to the surface liquid limit water contents by the percussion cup
of the soil particles. method vary between 0.5 and 5.6 kPa with the same or
It is well brought out by Sridharan and Venkatappa different base material (e.g. Whyte 1982; Wasti and
Rao (1979), Sridharan et al. (1986, 1988), Sridharan and Bezirci 1986); and in the case of cone method, this
Prakash (1999) that the mechanisms controlling variation is observed to be between 0.8 and 4.8 kPa
undrained shear strength and liquid limit for kaolinitic (Wasti and Bezirci 1986). Houlsby (1982, 1983) has
soils is different from that of montmorillonitic soils. shown theoretically that the shear strength at the liquid
This being the fact, it cannot be expected that the limit water content determined by the cone method
strength at the liquid limit water content to be unique for varies from 2.75 to 5.24 kPa.
all soils. This aspect has been confirmed by the results Youseff et al. (1965) tested a large number of
reported by Kenney (1963) and Youseff et al. (1965). remolded clays, measuring the shear strength with a
Atterberg limits are very important from under- laboratory vane as the water content was varied in the
standing the behaviour of fine-grained soils, but neighbourhood of the liquid limit. They observed a
correlations of the same with the undrained shear clear trend of decreasing shear strength with increas-
strength are to be reexamined. In this paper, an attempt ing value of the liquid limit. Over the range of liquid
has been made to understand better on the shear limit of 30–200% the range of shear strength observed
strength at liquid limit and plastic limit water contents was 1.3–2.7 kPa. They also reportedly stated that:
from the data available in the literature. ‘‘although the strength at liquid limit is essentially
small, a big relative difference is to be noted’’. Earlier,
Kenney (1963) has also reported variation of shear
2 Liquid Limit strengths observed for different soils at their liquid
limit water contents. Recently, Kayabali and Tufenkci
Atterberg defined liquid limit as the arbitrary limiting (2010) have reported a variation of undrained strength
water content at which the soil is liquid enough to flow at liquid limit ranging from 1.2 to 12 kPa. Table 1

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Table 1 Variation of undrained strength at liquid limit water content as reported in the literature
Sl. No. Range of undrained Range of Test adopted to Remarks Reference
strength at liquid limit liquid limit determine and Year
water content (kPa) undrained strength

1 0.8–1.6 41–72 Miniature vane Percussion cup method. Norman (1958)


(B.S Standards) shear apparatus
1.1–2.3 Effect of different rubber
(ASTM Standards) bases used on the
undrained strength
2 0.7–1.75 30–97 Vane shear test Percussion cup method Skempton and
Northey (1953)
3 1.3–2.7 32–190 Vane shear test Percussion cup method Youseff et al. (1965)
4 1–3 17–382 Vane shear test Percussion cup method Skopek and
Ter-Stepanian (1975)
5 Mean value of 1.7 26–190 Vane shear test Percussion cup method Wroth and Wood (1978)
6 2.75–5.24 – – Theoretical Analysis Houlsby (1982, 1983)
7 1.7–2.8 36–159 Vane shear test Cone method Federico (1983)
8 0.5–5.6 27–526 Vane shear test Percussion cup method Wasti and Bezirci (1986)
0.8–4.8 30–328 and Cone method
9 0.2–2.04 27.4–62.8 Viscometer Cone method Locat and Demers (1988)
10 0.66–1.35 29.8–100.8 Viscometer – Sridharan and
Prakash (1998)
11 1.2–12.0 26.4–83.6 Vane shear test Percussion cup method Kayabali and
Tufenkci (2010)

summarizes the undrained strength at liquid limit thread by hand with a sufficient pressure and at a
water as reported by various researchers in the specified rate. The moisture content, expressed as a
literature. percentage of the weight of oven dried soil at which
From the above it can be observed that the the soil mass will just begin to crumble when rolled
undrained shear strength values at liquid limit water into a thread of about 3 mm is considered as the plastic
content is quite variable and are both test dependent limit. Thus, the plastic limit of a soil is a measure of
and on the soil type. The variation of the shear strength cohesion of the soil particles to cracking when the
with soil type being important, which is observed to sample is worked (Yong and Warkentin 1976). The
vary nearly sixty times i.e., from as low as 0.2 kPa to cohesion between particles or units of particles must
as high as 12 kPa, suggesting that the shear strength of be sufficiently low to allow the particles to maintain
soils at liquid limit water content is not a unique value the new molded position. At this water content, the
and the definition of liquid limit based on shear particles will slide past one another on application of
strength is to be re-examined. force, but there is sufficient cohesion to allow them to
retain shape. However, reliable estimation of plastic
limit from this test is dependent on the personal
3 Plastic Limit judgement of the operator.

Atterberg defined plastic limit as the water content at 3.1 Discussion on Strength at Plastic Limit Water
which the clay paste cannot be rolled into a thread Content
(Casagrande 1932).
Casagrande developed a method popularly known Schofield and Wroth (1968) proposed that the failure
as the rolling thread method to determine plastic limit mechanism in the plastic limit test is analogous to the
of soils. In this method, a mass of soil is rolled into a Brazilian split cylinder test used to establish the tensile

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strength of concrete. However, unlike the cone pene- where D is the vertical separation in water content
trometer test, the rolling thread method of determining on the linear plots of water content versus logarithm
plastic limit does not provide a direct strength index. of penetration depth, d for the two cones of mass
Therefore, based on two considerations, firstly that the m1 and m2.
rolling thread method of determining plastic limit is Following the approach of Wroth and Wood
subjected to personal errors, and secondly, that it was (1978), Stone and Phan (1995) developed an instru-
desirable to evaluate the plastic limit as a measure of mented cone penetrometer to establish the moisture
strength in a similar manner as liquid limit is content of soil with strength 100 times that of the
determined using cone penetrometer, attempts were liquid limit which could be defined as the plastic limit.
made to use the same to determine plastic limit (e.g. But the method has not got universal acceptance.
Hansbo 1957, Towner 1973; Campbell 1976, 1983; Recently Sharma and Bora (2003) have furthered
Belviso et al. 1985; Sampson and Netterberg 1985, this concept of 100-fold increase in shear strength at
Wasti and Bezirci 1986; Rao 1987; Harison 1988; plastic limit water content over that at the liquid limit
Stone and Phan 1995; Rashid et al. 2008). Towner with their set of experimental results. Prakash (2003)
(1973) and Harison (1988) suggested that the moisture discussed citing reasons for the fallacy of their support
content corresponding to 2-mm penetration might be to the above concept.
taken as the plastic limit. Campbell (1976) felt that the It is understood that the plastic limit of a soil is a
moisture content corresponding to minimum of the measure of cohesion of the soil particles to cracking
moisture content versus cone penetration curve (which when the sample is worked (Yong and Warkentin
on an average corresponded to 1.36-mm depth of 1976). Recently, Sridharan and Prakash (1999) have
penetration) could be taken as the plastic limit. summarized the two concepts identified from the
Sampson and Netterberg (1985) suggested that the literature regarding the development of cohesion in
moisture content corresponding to 5-mm depth of clays. According to the first concept, cohesion is due to
penetration should be taken as the plastic limit. Though the viscosity of double-layer water, a part of which is
many attempts have been made to obtain plastic limit the adsorbed water surrounding the soil particles. The
from the cone penetrometer itself, there is lot of second concept is that the cohesion is due to the
ambiguity about the depth of penetration at which the manifestation of net inter particle attractive forces in
plastic limit can be taken. the clay-electrolyte system. In order to verify the
A school of thought from Cambridge group was above two concepts, they made a detail study, and
working parallelly using critical state concept to came to the following conclusions:
develop a correlation between the strength of soils at
1. The undrained strength of montmorillonitic soils
plastic limit in terms of the strength at the liquid limit.
is primarily due to the viscous shear resistance due
Wroth and Wood (1978) tried to redefine plastic limit in
to diffuse double-layer water and that of kaolinitic
terms of strength as that water content that gives a 100-
soils is primarily due to the net attractive force and
fold increase in shear strength over that at the liquid
the mode of particle arrangement as dictated by
limit. Using the limited data of four soils from
the inter-particle forces.
Skempton and Northey (1953), Wroth and Wood
2. Cohesion is due to inter-particle attraction, which
(1978) approximated the undrained shear strength at
results in increased flocculation and higher shear
plastic limit water content as 170 kPa, and assumed it
strength at the particle level in the case of
nearly 100 times the averaged undrained shear strength
kaolinitic soils and to the viscous resistance of
of 1.7 kPa at the liquid limit, which they obtained from
double-layer water in the case of montmorillonitic
the work of Youseff et al. (1965). With this assumption
soils.
in the background, using critical state concepts and a
series of cone penetration tests with two different cone
mass of m1 (80 g) and m2 (240 g), Wroth and Wood 4 Variation of Undrained Strength with Water
(1978) showed the following relationships to obtain the Content
plasticity index, Ip and hence the plastic limit, wp:
The variation of undrained strength of soil with water
Ip ¼ D log10 100= log10 ðm2 =m1 Þ ð1Þ
content has been well documented in literature

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(Towner 1973; Federico 1983; Zreik et al. 1997; 4.1 Discussion on Undrained Strength at Liquid
Lee 2004; Trauner et al. 2005; Hong, et al. 2006). Limit and Plastic Limit Water Contents
The various forms of relationship of undrained
strength with ratio of water content to liquid limit Results of undrained strength at liquid limit and plastic
(Federico 1983; Lee 2004; Berilgen et al. 2007); limit water contents from the literature (Wasti and
undrained strength (either Cu or Su) with liquidity Bezirci 1986; Kayabali and Tufenkci 2010) are
index (Skempton and Northey 1953; Schofield and presented here. Figure 1 is a plot of undrained strength
Wroth 1968; Whyte 1982; Leroueil 1983; Locat at liquid limit water content obtained both from
and Demers 1988; Yilmaz 2000; Koumoto and Casagrande’s percussion cup device and cone pene-
Houlsby 2001; Berilgen et al. 2007, to name a tration method. It can be seen from the figure that the
few); Cu with water content (Berilgen et al. 2007); strength at liquid limit is not unique and the variation
Cu with consistency index (Berilgen et al. 2007) as is quite significant (about 60 times). It can be observed
reported by various researchers has been tabulated that the strength has reduced with the increase in liquid
in Table 2. The recent work in this direction as limit, though with scatter. Additionally, the undrained
reported by Edil and Benson (2009) relating Cu strength of a clayey soil also depends on the dominant
with liquid limit (Eq. 13 in Table 2) is quite clay mineral present and the mechanism that controls
revealing. the behaviour in the method adopted, and hence the
The variation of compressive strength of even rock scatter. This aspect has been well brought out by
with water content has been reported in the literature Sridharan and Prakash (2000).
(Romana and Vásárhelyi 2007), bringing out the fact The undrained strength at plastic limit water
that strength is a function of water content. content versus plastic limit obtained by both Casa-
From above discussion, it is clear that soils cannot grande’s rolling thread method, and by Cone method
have a unique value of strength at different values of (Wasti and Bezirci 1986; Kayabali and Tufenkci
water contents. Liquid limit or plastic limit being the 2010) has been presented in Fig. 2. It can be seen that
water holding capacity of the soil at different states of the undrained strength is quite variable, ranging from
consistency, it can be inferred that different soils as high as 600 kPa to as low as 35 kPa (about
having varied values of liquid limit or plastic cannot seventeen times variation). Figure 3 is a similar plot of
be presumed to have unique undrained strength. undrained strength at plastic limit water content versus

Table 2 Correlation
Eq. No. Equation Remarks Author and year
between undrained strength
with physical properties of  
1 5:25 1:161ww
Cu relating w/wL Federico (1983)
soil Cu ¼ e L

 
2 2:3714 w Lee (2004)
wL
Cu ¼ 182:93 e
 
3  2:86 w Berilgen et al. (2007)
wL
Cu ¼ 145 e
4 ln ðcu Þ ¼ 11:5  2:2 lnðwÞ Cu relating w Berilgen et al. (2007)
5 Cu ¼ 282:61 lnðwÞ
6 Cu ¼ 1:6 e4:23 ð1IL Þ Cu relating IL Whyte (1982)
 2:64
7 Locat and Demers (1988)
Cu ¼ 19:8
I L

8 Cu ¼ 28 e 1:33 IL Berilgen et al. (2007)


9 Cu ¼ 8:55 e1:25 IC Cu relating IC Berilgen et al. (2007)
10 1 Su relating IL Leroueil et al. (1983)
Su ¼ 2
ðIL 0:21Þ
Cu or Su as reported in the 11 Su ¼ 170 eð 4:6 IL Þ Schofield and Wroth (1968)
equations presented in
12  ð1:72 IL Þ Edil and Benson (2009)
Table 2 are expressed in Su ¼ 144:9 e
kPa, except Eq. 2, which is 13 Su ¼ 191:4 e ð0:03 wL Þ Su relating wL Edil and Benson (2009)
expressed in psf

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Fig. 1 Undrained strength at liquid limit versus liquid limit by Fig. 2 Undrained strength at plastic limit versus plastic limit by
both Casagrande’s and cone method (data after Wasti and both Casagrande’s and cone method (data after Wasti and
Bezirci 1986; Kayabali and Tufenkci 2010) Bezirci 1986; Kayabali and Tufenkci 2010)

plastic limit obtained from Dennehy (1978). Here also


there is a varying trend of the undrained strength
(about seven times variation), ranging from as high as
220 kPa to as low as 30 kPa, averaging to a value of
about 115 kPa. Most of the undrained strength data at
plastic limit presented in Figs. 2 and 3 are quite
different from the assumed average value of strength
at plastic limit of 170 kPa by various researchers in the
literature, for e.g., Wroth and Wood 1978, Stone and
Phan 1995 and Sharma and Bora 2003. Here, it is
appropriate to present the remoulded undrained
strength of natural deposits independently reported
in literature (Bell 2002) as given below.
Bell (2002) in his study of geotechnical properties
of some till deposits occurring along the coastal areas
of eastern England has reported the mean values of
remoulded undrained strength of soils at natural water
content, which are very close to their plastic limits and
Fig. 3 Undrained strength at plastic limit versus plastic limit by
have shown a decreasing trend with increase in water
Casagrande’s method (data after Dennehy 1978)
content and also the values range from 81 to 164 kPa,
as tabulated in Table 3 and presented in Fig. 4. From
Fig. 4, it is clear that remolded undrained strength is a The assumption that there is a 100-fold increase in
function of the water content of the soil (very close to strength at plastic limit water content as compared to
the plastic limit) at which the strength is determined. that of liquid limit water content has found a strong

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Table 3 Physical properties and remolded undrained strength


of natural soils for literature (Bell 2002)
Soil description Average Average Remolded
natural plastic undrained
moisture limit strength at
content wP (%) natural moisture
wn (%) content (kN/m2)

Hunstanton till 17.6 18.0 134


Chalky boulder 23.6 20.0 81
Contorted drift 15.6 14.0 136
Cromer till 13.2 17.0 156
Hessle till 22.6 22.0 96
Withernsea till 16.9 18.0 136
Skipsea till 15.5 16.0 164
Basement till 17.0 20.0 156

Fig. 5 Undrained strength ratio at plastic limit to liquid limit


versus liquid limit by both Casagrande’s and cone method (data
after Wasti and Bezirci 1986; Kayabali and Tufenkci 2010)

Fig. 4 Remoulded undrained strength versus natural water


content (data after Bell 2002)

foot hold in geotechnical literature. To verify this fact,


plot of ratio of undrained strength at plastic limit to
liquid limit (as plotted in Figs. 1 and 2) versus liquid
limit by both Casagrande’s method and cone method
are presented in Fig. 5. From this figure, it can be seen
that the undrained strength ratio at plastic limit to that
of liquid limit is quite variable, being as low as 15 to as
Fig. 6 Undrained strength ratio at plastic limit to liquid limit
high as 295. It can also be observed that the strength versus plastic limit by both Casagrande’s and cone method (data
ratio has an increasing trend with the liquid limit. after Wasti and Bezirci 1986; Kayabali and Tufenkci 2010)

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Fig. 8 Undrained strength ratio at plastic limit to liquid limit


Fig. 7 Undrained strength ratio at plastic limit to liquid limit versus plasticity index by both Casagrande’s and cone method
versus ratio of liquid limit to plastic limit by both Casagrande’s (data after Wasti and Bezirci 1986; Kayabali and Tufenkci
and cone method (data after Wasti and Bezirci 1986; Kayabali 2010)
and Tufenkci 2010)

Figure 6 is a plot of the same strength ratio versus Earlier it was seen that though the value of
plastic limit, which is observed to have a decreasing undrained shear strength at the liquid limit water
trend with the plastic limit. From Figs. 5 and 6, it is content is less, the variation was observed to be nearly
further evident that undrained strength is having a sixty times and that at plastic limit to be as high as
functional dependency of water content. To further seventeen times. The ratio of undrained strength at
verify this fact, the strength ratio is plotted versus the plastic limit to liquid limit could vary significantly.
ratio of liquid limit to plastic limit, and strength ratio Hence, any attempt to relate the undrained shear
versus plasticity index as shown in Figs. 7 and 8, strength at plastic limit water content in terms of that at
respectively. From these figures the strength ratio is liquid limit water content leads to incorrect predictions
found to increase with the ratio of liquid limit to plastic and hence is not tenable.
limit or increase in plasticity index. The correlation of
strength ratio is better with the ratio of liquid limit to
plastic limit. 5 Conclusions
With the above discussion, it can be understood that
shear strength is not unique both at liquid limit and Published data from the various literature sources
plastic limit. This being the fact, it would be mislead- clearly show that there is no unique value of undrained
ing to redefine the plastic limit in terms of strength as strength that can be assigned either to the liquid limit
that water content that gives a 100-fold increase in or plastic limit of soils. Further, critical analysis has
shear strength over that at the liquid limit. Also, it revealed that the mechanisms involved in controlling
would be appropriate here to quote from the study of liquid and plastic limits of fine-grained soils are very
remolded strength of cohesive soils by Dennehy different dependent on the type of apparatus used and
(1978) that: ‘‘Universal limits in terms of a multipli- amount of clay minerals with associated cations
cand of plastic limit are found to be inappropriate’’. present in the soils. Hence, any attempt to relate the

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undrained shear strength at plastic limit water content Kayabali K, Tufenkci OO (2010) Shear strength of remolded
in terms of that at liquid limit water content leads to soils at consistency limits. Can Geotech J 47(3):259–266
Kenney TC (1963) Atterberg limits, correspondence. Gêotech-
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former graduate student Sravan Muguda for his active Lambe TW, Whitman RV (1979) Soil mechanics. John Wiley &
involvement in the preparation of the paper. Sons, New York, p 31
Lee LT (2004) Predicting geotechnical parameters for dredged
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