About the Book
This book contains 73 technical papers and 7 keynote papers from the industry experts were presented at the 9th International Conference on Analysis of Discontinuous Deformation — New Developments and Applications held in the Nanyang Technological University, Singapore on 25–27 November 2009. It represents the latest advances in numerical and analytical methods related to rock mechanics and engineering.
Following the tradition of the conference series, the main schemes of the conference papers are on the key block theory and its engineering applications, the discontinuous deformation analysis (DDA) method and the numerical manifold method (NMM). However, other relevant topics, for example, the distinct/discrete element method, the meshless method, the finite element method in rock mechanics and engineering applications are also included.
For rock masses where the discontinuities dominate their behaviour in a rock engineering system such as rock slopes and underground rock caverns, the analysis of discontinuous deformation is of critical importance in the stability analysis and engineering design. It is hoped that this book serves as a useful reference for both researchers and engineers on the new developments and applications of the various available modeling techniques and tools in this increasingly important field of rock mechanics and engineering.