Parameter identification for elasto-plastic modelling of unsaturated soils from pressuremeter tests by parallel modified particle swarm optimization

This paper presents a methodology for the identification of parameter values in the Barcelona Basic Model (BBM) by inverse analysis of the experimental cavity pressure-cavity strain curve from pressuremeter tests in unsaturated soils. This methodology involves a high-dimensional optimization process which is particularly challenging due to the existence of a large number of local minima caused by the nonlinearity of the BBM. A novel parallel modified particle swarm optimization algorithm is utilized to minimize the difference between measured and computed values on the cavity pressure-cavity strain curve. The computed cavity pressure-cavity strain curve is obtained by using a finite element model of an unsaturated soil whose mechanical behaviour is described by the BBM. An example is presented to validate the proposed methodology making use of artificial experimental results that had been calculated by a finite element simulation of pressuremeter tests. Finally, the application to a real case is presented by showing that the proposed methodology can safely identify the values of at least six BBM parameters via inverse analysis of pressuremeter tests at different suction levels. © 2012 Elsevier Ltd.