Fundamentals of direct methods in poroplasticity

A nonlinear initial-boundary-value coupled problem, central to poroplasticity, is formulated under the hypotheses of small deformations, quasi-static regime, full saturation, linear Darcy diffusion law and piecewise-linearized stable and hardening poroplastic material model. After a preliminary nonconventional multifield (mixed) finite element modelling, shakedown and upper bound theorems are presented and discussed, numerically tested and applied to dam engineering situations using commercial linear and quadratic programming solvers. Limitations of the presented methodology and future prospects are discussed in the conclusions.