Cyclic stress–dilatancy relations and plastic flow potentials for soils based on hypothesis of complementarity of stress–dilatancy conjugates

Abstract Soil, rocks and rock masses dilate or compact when sheared, i.e., distortion necessitates volume change. This coupling between distortional strains volumetric strains, described by stress–dilatancy theories, endows soils with manifestation of peculiar characteristics they are subjected to shear. Stress–dilatancy theories have become central in describing the mechanical energy dissipation mechanism further establishing flow rules constitutive modelling soils. The classical such as Taylor's Rowe's, endowed simplicity descriptive power, but were developed for dilatancy behaviour loading shear (mobilizing away from isotropic stress state) needed be extended plastic shear-induced changes cyclic In this paper, hypothesis complementarity conjugates is proposed a unifying deriving relations both unloading Then, potential functions derived based on resulting relations. so doing, rendered quality used deformation behavior monotonic shearing. theoretical framework applied first plane strain axisymmetric stress–strain conditions; then general condition considering Lode angle dependency strength soils, using multilaminate applying Matsuoka–Nakai spatial mobilized plane.