Angus Pettey

Contact

• workRoom 122 L2
  University Park
  Nottingham
  NG7 2RD
  UK
• Angus.Pettey@nottingham.ac.uk

Biography

My doctoral study started in October 2019 in the Nottingham Centre for Geomechanics (NCG). The aim of my PhD is to investigate the behaviour of soil-structure interfaces, and improve the models engineers currently use to predict their behaviour. Interfaces occur in every single civil engineering project on dry land. Rather oddly in respect of this fact, their behaviour is not widely understood, and vast amounts of resources are spent over-engineering their designs to stave off failure from wear over long periods of time. A lack of full understanding of how the engineered world responds to wear can often lead to catastrophe.

Research Summary

Writing the first journal paper of my doctorate. Est. completion: Q3 2020

• Working title: A micromechanically driven analysis of soil-structure interface degradation
• Aims/Objectives: Following the publication of Effect of Crushed Particles on Soil-Structure Interface Behaviour at the 4th European Conference on Physical Modelling in Geotechnics, this paper seeks to develop a framework for the change in soil-structure interface behaviour over the course of thousands of shear displacements.
• Methods: I designed a novel testing apparatus for the shearing of a single particle, under similar conditions to the large samples tested on another apparatus within NCG. Using statistical modelling, surface profiling and image based shape characterisation of the single particle tests, a framework can be established for the global response.

Follow my personal blog at pettey.co.uk

Future Research

You can follow the process of my future research through my personal blog where I cover the process of developing a new journal paper entry, from initial conception through to publication.