Estimation of the oriental shear strength of deep sea sediments from engineering index properties

Abstract

Multiple linear regression techniques were employed in a statistical analysis of data from 114 deep sea cores in order to derive an equation for predicting shear strength from sediment engineering index properties.Water content, depth of burial, liquid limit, and plastic limit proved to be the only factors significantly influencing the strength in these cores.The multiple and individual correlation coefficients between these four parameters and the logarithm of shear strength proved to be higher than the coefficients computed in a linear strength relation. Additionally, other regression analysis were conducted to determine a water content prediction equation and to investigate correlations among other sediment properties. Water content is shown to be highly correlated with liquid limit. Ancillary to the above analysis, tests were conducted to determine the degree of reproducibility of original liquid limit values from dried sediment material.