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The choice of a pure cohesive or a pure frictional viscoplastic model to represent the rheological behaviour of a flowslide is of paramount importance in order to obtain accurate results for real cases. The principal goal of the present work is to clarify the influence of the type of viscous model—pure cohesive versus pure frictional—with the numerical reproduction of two different real flowslides that occurred in 1966: the Aberfan flowslide and the Gypsum tailings impoundment flowslide. In the present work, a depth-integrated model based on the v-pw Biot–Zienkiewicz formulation, enhanced with a diffusion-like equation to account for the pore pressure evolution within the soil mass, is applied to both 1966 cases. For the Aberfan flowslide, a frictional viscous model based on Perzyna viscoplasticity is considered, while a pure cohesive viscous model (Bingham model) is considered for the case of the Gypsum flowslide. The numerical approach followed is the SPH method, which has been enriched by adding a 1D finite difference grid to each SPH node in order to improve the description of the pore water evolution in the propagating mixture. The results obtained by the performed simulations are in agreement with the documentation obtained through the UK National Archive (Aberfan flowslide) and the International Commission of large Dams (Gypsum flowslide).

I would really like to thank all the members of the M2i group for having been an important support and, of course, for their friendship. In particular I want to say a big thank to Ana Sofa, Silvia, Angel, Diego and Tom. And thank to all the M.Sc visitor students and Ph.D. visitor students that have come to Madrid during these years and shared their path with me: Antonella, Vittoria, Ilaria, Nunzio and Stefania.Many thanks to my parents: Germana and Enzo. They know want they mean to me.

Suction Bucket Jackets (SBJ) are found as a suitable alternative to driven piles for the support of jacket or tripod foundations for offshore wind energy converters. Offshore wind energy turbines are characterized by a small self weight and they can be subjected to different load combinations. The work presented here aims to show the numerical investigation on the behavior of suction bucket foundations under different kind of loads as well as load combinations. In order to do so, a suitable numerical model is much needed. The theoretical basis of the model lies on the Swansea formulation of Biots equations of dynamic poroelasticity combined with a constitutive model that reproduces key aspects of cyclic soil behavior in the frame of the theory of generalized plasticity. An adequate FE formulation, the representation of appropriate soil-structure interfaces and the computational efficiency are key aspects in order to successfully model such complex systems. The 3D numerical simulation allows a special insight into the fundamental behavior of the founding of Suction Bucket Jackets such as the evolution of the pore water pressure or the occurrence of the so called soil liquefaction.