Richard Wan's Picture

Professor Richard Wan

PhD, PEng.

Positions

Professor

Schulich School of Engineering, Department of Civil Engineering

Contact information

Email

wan@ucalgary.ca

Phone number

Office: +1 (403) 220-5504

Location

Civil Engineering: Engineering Block F274

For media enquiries, contact

Joe McFarland
Media Relations and Communications Specialist

Cell: +1.403.671.2710
Email: Joe.Mcfarland@ucalgary.ca

Preferred method of communication

Email is my preferred method of communication.

I'm looking for...

Learning opportunities

I am always looking for excellent PhD graduate students in the general area of Mechanics and Computational Mechanics with focus on geomaterials.

Background

Educational Background

Degree of Gen Univ Studies Other Basic Sciences, University of Clermont-Ferrand, 1980

Dipl Ing Civil Engineering, Ecole Nationale des Travaux Publics de l'Etat, 1983

Master of Applied Science Civil Engineering, University of Ottawa, 1985

Doctor of Philosophy Civil Engineering, University of Alberta, 1990

Biography

I have many years of experience in geomechanics with special emphasis on continuum mechanics, micromechanics, experimental mechanics, soil and rock mechanics, constitutive laws for engineering materials and computational modelling of complex geotechnical structures via a multiscale and multiphysics approach. I am the recipient of the first Robert J. Melosh medal in Finite Element Analysis, Duke University, USA.

I serve on the Editorial Board of several leading International Journals in geomechanics and is a member of the TC103 (Numerical Methods) of the ISSMGE. My research expertise covers the fields of Geomechanics, Micromechanics and Computational Mechanics with applications such as energy resource extraction, cold regions engineering, stability of unsaturated dykes, and fully mechanistic pavement design. Lately, I have had a keen interest in extending geomechanics theories in thermodynamics views via concepts of entropy in dissipative systems with ramifications to complex systems. This has led to a recent NSERC transdisciplinary project such as the modelling of a pandemic using a mechanistic, multiscale approach. 

I have supervised and graduated over 50 PhD students with three of them being professors in major Canadian Universities. I work within an international research network and is the author of over 150 publications and has published 3 books.

Research

Areas of Research

Failure of Geomaterials

Geomaterials—soil, rock, clay, granular materials, permafrost, among others—are distinct from engineering materials in that they are multiphasic and particulate in nature via a grain-pore scale textural arrangement of the solid component and fluid occupied pore spaces. It is these fine aspects that govern their deformational, strength and failure behaviours. 

I have interests in this area where mathematically and physically sound descriptions of failure in geomaterials are proposed with microstructural aspects as a backdrop. Advancing the knowledge further, I construct a unified description of failure as a material instability of deformation modes within the theory of bifurcation and the second-order work framework. My works offer a contemporary view of geomaterials by developing rigorous and consistent failure theories alongside engineering applications such as soil nailing, landslides, energy resource extraction, and internal erosion in soils.

Deformations in granular materials as a discrete system

Stress-dilatancy is an important feature of geomaterials that involves inelastic volume increase under shearing, closely linked to soil liquefaction, strain localization, and critical state soil mechanics. I introduce fabric into the dilatancy of sand as a geometric constraint imposed by grain textural arrangement against externally applied loads, including the non-coaxiality of plastic deformation rate with current stress during cyclic loading (where principal stresses rotate) such as beneath foundations of wind turbines and behind bridge abutment.

I investigate the problem of flow landslide triggering at the grain scale to introduce the idea of unjamming, loss of isostaticity, grain contact deformation and structural anisotropy evolution. Seen as a complex system, I analyze micro-seismic events in granular material deformations and link them to the signature of failure.

Other noteworthy research endeavours are also in preferential attachment as a mechanism of force network growth in sand, as well as the construction of a thermodynamics theory for granular materials. The constitutive modelling of granular materials via physics-based ANN is also an active area of my research.

Unsaturated Soil Mechanics and related fields

The research particularly investigates pendular unsaturated soils at the pore scale where I have micromechanically derived a stress expression that captures the separate effects of contact (skeleton) stress and capillary (surface tension and membrane) stress through the spatial distributions of liquid bridges and interfaces. A ramification is the study of the water retention characteristics of salt-impacted soils due to drilling and mining activities. A physics-based model was developed that generates numerically the soil water characteristic curve starting solely from porosity and grain size distribution, thus eliminating expensive and lengthy lab determination. More sophisticated numerical modelling of water and air movement in unsaturated soils using a coupled Lattice Boltzmann-Discrete Element Modelling (LBM-DEM) approach has been developed.

I also have interest in a closely related topic to unsaturated soil is permafrost where capillary effects are replaced by cryosuction which can be rapidly lost during thawing. Here also, we have made major contributions in the numerical modelling of the stability of permafrost underlying a uranium ore deposit during excavation such as the feasibility of the Kiggavik Uranium Mine project.

Petroleum Geomechanics

At issue, is to better understand the thermo-mechanical properties of Colorado shales as a cap rock protective layer above an oilsand reservoir in Alberta, and how to safely fracture interbedded shale intrusions in the reservoir that hinder steam growth, hence oil production during steam injection.

I have developed new lab experimental techniques for testing shale as a complex material with a high degree of structuration due to diagenesis. These unravelled the most salient thermo-mechanical characteristics of shale, providing unique lab results to industry. At the same time, multi-scale constitutive laws for clay-rich shales that capture swelling behaviours were developed. 

Regarding controlled fracturing in interbedded shales, I proposed an innovative solution where the rapid heating of the in-situ water by electromagnetic (EM) waves is exploited to cause a surge in pore pressures. I also have an avid interest in new approaches to model hydraulic fracturing of brittle rocks using a multiscale framework. Fracturing is seen as an initially diffuse process in which all pre-existing microfractures are activated, followed by persistence of only a few to localize damage into a primary fracture. 

Pipelines

Buried pipelines in the oil and gas industry are energy infrastructures subjected to complex soil-pipe loading in uplift, lateral and axial modes as they traverse different terrains and geological formations. My interests in soil-pipeline research are in the large-scale testing of buried pipes in clays and sands under controlled conditions, and the measurement of soil-pipe resistances under conditions consistent with a moving mountain slope. New relationships to estimate the pipeline resistances have been proposed to address deficiencies of current design guidelines. More importantly, they provide invaluable information to confidently analyze the long-term behaviour of pipelines in slow creeping slopes.

Mechanistic modelling of pandemics

Models of infectious disease propagation have performed poorly in the COVID-19 pandemic, leaving researchers unable to accurately predict new viral waves. As the pandemic has now been under control, dangerous new virus mutations with a waning population immunity are of critical concern in preparing for the next pandemic. I am interested in the next generation of dynamic and analytical, mechanism-based, models that will be more accurate, incisive, and flexible than current tools. 

Most notably, I am interested in marrying granular mechanics with existing social, epidemiological, and economics models, seeking a computationally viable approach that uses the mechanics of granular matter to produce a robust and flexible model of virus transmission under new variants and current levels of immunity—vaccinated, boosted, and natural. 

Fully mechanistic design of pavement systems

The design of pavement systems, especially those where modern materials are involved to face large traffic loads and extreme climatic conditions, requires a fully mechanistic approach. I am interested in developing multiscale constitutive models for new pavement mixes where aggregates and fines are mixed with asphalt binders that contain polymeric additives. These will enter a full-blown finite element code that can evaluate the stability and durability of a highway at different scales against performance criteria such as resilience to cracks, rutting and stripping,

Participation in university strategic initiatives

Energy innovations for today and tomorrow

Engineering solutions for health

Human dynamics in a changing world

Infections, inflammation and chronic diseases

New earth-space technologies

Courses

Course number Course title Semester
ENCI 523 Geotechnical Engineering II Fall 2023
ENCI 673 Constitutive Laws For Geomaterials Fall 2023
ENCI 423 Geotechnical Engineering I Winter 2021
ENCI 523 Geotechnical Engineering II Fall 2020
ENCI 673 Constitutive Laws For Geomaterials Fall 2020
ENCI 619.03 Hydrology and Slope Stability Winter 2022
ENCI 655 Numerical Methods for Modelling Geomaterials Winter 2019

Projects

Micromechanics of unsaturated porous media across all saturation regimes

This is the topic of my NSERC-Discovery Grant where I study how water occupies pore spaces of a soil with application in the cyclical wetting and drying of a slope due to fluctuating climate. The central question is how does water saturation in soils lead to distinct capillary regimes that can spontaneously modify their behaviour from solid to fluid state. How do we mathematically describe such a brutal transition that translates into a wetting collapse of geostructures? It urns out that this longstanding question has microstructural origins, being intimately linked to the loss of suction between grains.

We investigate formidable issues such as how grain contacts, water menisci and interfaces between phases in an unsaturated soil evolve as water saturation increases (decreases) during wetting (draining). A multiscale approach is thus mandated where an element volume capturing all the local microstructural complexities of fluid and solid interactions is studied, and thereafter statistically upscaled to establish relationships between stress, strain, and capillary stresses at the continuum level for the analysis of a geostructure. A new framework is developed that underscores the collective interactions of water and air in pore spaces coupled with solid particles through discrete element modelling for solids and the Lattice Boltzmann method for water and air. This facilitates the modelling of complex formation, coalescence, and rupture of water menisci in the pore space.

Unsaturated constitutive laws that account for these transitions are developed and implemented into a Material Point Method computational code. This groundbreaking modelling paradigm provides a powerful tool that can precisely analyze the complex response of geostructures against climatic fluctuations, especially flow type failures.

Data-Driven modelling of multiphase flow in unsaturated porous media

Wet granular soils involve the computation of multiphase fluid (water and air) movement inside their pore spaces using Lattice Boltzmann Method (LBM) simulations coupled with Discrete Element Modelling (DEM) of solid grains dynamics, which are both computer power intensive. The simulation time increases drastically as the resolution of the simulation scene scales up to the soil specimen, or larger, even when using Graphics Processing Units (GPU) based computing algorithms.

The project develops a data-driven model which is an attractive alternative of a direct simulation based numerical method such as LBM/DEM. This new model architecture uses machine learning algorithms in the most computationally intensive part of the simulation to achieve real-time simulation speed. Within the current LBM/DEM model, the state of a porous unsaturated soil is represented by calculating the positions and velocities of air, water, and solid mesoscopic (packets of) particles. 

Alluding to a time dependent dynamical system, a new paradigm is developed where the connectivity of the various particle species (phases) is described by a graph that is continually evolving. The data-driven model will predict the state of a system at the next time step solely based on the current one. The update mechanism will be comprised of a graph-based neural network (GNN) being trained through deep learning using actual LBM/DEM computations for the first few time steps. The next time steps will then proceed using solely the trained network with corrections as in a predictor-corrector scheme. Computations will eventually advance in time, alternating between the GNN and actual (ground truth) computations in an active, on the fly, learning environment. The introduction of the proposed data-driven modelling approach will not only greatly alleviate the LBM/DEM computations, but also allow us to analyze a slope being subjected to fluctuating amounts of water mimicking variable rainfall intervals. By extension, digital twinning with actual field data can be envisaged.

A mechanistic computational framework for modelling a pandemic and socio-economic response against new virus variants

This project has been recently funded by the NSERC Discovery Horizon program. The idea is to marry granular mechanics with existing social, epidemiological, and economics models, seeking a computationally viable approach that uses the mechanics of granular matter to produce a robust and flexible model of virus transmission under new variants and current levels of immunity—vaccinated, boosted, and natural. While principles of mechanics govern force interactions between solid particles, social, cultural, epidemiological, and virological rules drive interactions between individuals in a disease-infected population. To translate mechanics principles to the pandemic problem, we will use a discrete element modelling approach where individuals are viewed as particles interacting through contact laws that include socioeconomic, viral and epidemiological aspects. Rather than developing a continuum approach, the result will be a new type of agent-based model of circulating virus variants transfer that facilitates tasks like model calibration and scenario analysis, including pandemic preparedness and response. The model, being multi-scale in nature, can address various population sizes: from household, school, community, city, country, to the planet if needed.

Awards

  • Keynote Lecture on Micromechanics of Unsaturated Granular Media, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. 2024
  • Keynote Lecture on Landslides, International Society on Landslides. 2024
  • Keynote Lecture, EMI - Engineering Mechanics Institute, ASCE. 2019
  • Gudehus Lecture, Institut fur Geotechnik, Universitat fur Bondenkultur, Vienna. 2018
  • Keynote Lecture, COMGEO-International Centre for Computational Engineering. 2018
  • Keynote Lecture, IACMAG (International Association for Computer Methods and Advances in Geomechanics.). 2017
  • Executive Board Member, SIAM. 2015
  • Invited Lecture at SIAM Geoscience 15, SIAM. 2015
  • Invited Paper for Special Issue "A tribute to Felix Darve", IJNAG. 2015
  • Invited Talk at European Solid Mechanics Conference (ESMC2015), 2015
  • Outstanding Teaching Performance, University of Calgary. 2015
  • NSERC Strategic Project Grant, NSERC. 2014
  • Professor of the Year, University of Calgary. 2014
  • Vice Chair, TC103 Committee on Numerical Methods in Geomechanics, ISMGE. 2014
  • Best Keynote Lecture, NUMOG. 2013
  • Co-organizer of the 3rd International Symposium on Computational Geomechanics, NUMOG. 2013
  • Invited Keynote Lecture, ISMGE. 2013
  • Invited Paper on Micromechanics of Granular Materials, ISMGE. 2013
  • Invited Talk at Engineering Mechanics Institute (EMI) - ASCE, 2013
  • Chairman and Organizer of a Special Session on Numerical Modelling in Geotechnical Engineering, CGS. 2012
  • Executive Board Member, 2012
  • Lecturer at CISM Course, 2012
  • Vice Chair, TC103 Committee on Numerical Methods in Geomechanics, ISMGE. 2012
  • Co-organizer of the 2nd International Symposium on Computational Geomechanics, 2011
  • Guest Editor - IJNAMG, 2011
  • Guest Editor - Springer Geomechanics Series, 2011
  • Invited Keynote Lecture, 2011
  • Lecturer at CISM Course, International Center for Mechanical Sciences. 2011
  • NSERC Discovery Accelerator Supplement, NSERC. 2011
  • Visiting Professor, CNRS. 2011
  • Chairman and Organizer of a Special Session on Numerical Modelling in Geotechnical Engineering, 2010
  • Dr. R.M. Butler Memorial Best Paper, SPE. 2010
  • Invited Keynote Lecture, 2010
  • Vice Chair, TC103 Committee on Numerical Methods in Geomechanics, ISMGE. 2010
  • Co-organizer of the 1st International Symposium on Computational Geomechanics, 2009
  • Invited Keynote Lecture, Nagoya University. 2009
  • Visiting Professor, Japanese Society for Promotion of Science. 2009
  • Chairman and Organizer of a Special Session on Numerical Modelling in Geotechnical Engineering, 2008
  • Chairman and Organizer of the 8th. International Workshop in Bifurcation and Degradations in Geomechanics, IWBDG. 2008
  • Guest Editor - Geomechanics Series, IWBDG. 2008
  • Guest Editor - IJNAMG, International Society for Geomechanics. 2008
  • Chair, Computer Committee of Canadian Geotechnical Engineering Society, CGS. 2007
  • Chair, Computer Committee of Canadian Geotechnical Engineering Society, CGS. 2005
  • Chairman and Organizer of a Special Session on Numerical Modelling in Geotechnical Engineering, CGS. 2005
  • Chairman and Organizer of the 8th. International Workshop in Bifurcation and Degradations in Geomechanics, 2005
  • General Reporter for Modelling and Numerical Methods in Geotechnical Engineering - 16th International Conference on Soil Mechanics and Geotechnical Engineering, ISMGE. 2005
  • Invited Lead Lecture, Numerical Methods in Geomechanics. 2005
  • Research Excellence in Civil Engineering, University of Calgary. 2005
  • Visiting Professor, CNRS, France. 2005
  • Chair, Computer Committee of Canadian Geotechnical Engineering Society, CGS. 2004
  • General Reporter for Modelling and Numerical Methods in Geotechnical Engineering - 16th International Conference on Soil Mechanics and Geotechnical Engineering, ISMGE. 2004
  • Keynote Lecture, Numerical Methods in Geomechanics. 2004

Publications

  • Failure mechanics of geomaterials. J. Duriez; R. Wan; F. Prunier; F. Darve; F. Nicot. 137-169. (2015)
  • Microstructural Views of Stresses in Three-Phase Granular Materials. R. Wan; J. Duriez; F. Darve. 143-165. (2017)
  • Failure in geomaterials: A contemporary treatise. R. Wan; F. Nicot; F. Darve. 1-202. (2017)
  • Multiscale Analysis of Failure in Granular Materials: A Geomechanics Perspective. Richard G Wan. ISTE-WILEY. 256. (2019)
  • A finite element study of localized and diffuse deformations in sand based on a density-stress-fabric dependent elastoplastic model. M. Pinheiro; R. G. Wan. 423-428. (2009)
  • A coupled erosion-stress deformation model for sand production using streamline upwind finite elements. J. Wang; R. G. Wan. (2002)
  • Multiscale computations of hydraulic fracture propagation in low-permeability heterogeneous rocks. M. Eghbalian; L.S.K. Fung; R. G. Wan; M. Pouragha. (2019)
  • Finite element modelling of sand production under foamy oil flow in heavy oil reservoirs. R. G. Wan; Y. Liu. (2005)
  • Analysis of failure in geostructures via the second order work. R. Wan; M. Pinheiro. (2009)
  • Joint stiffness and deformation behaviour of discontinuous rock. M. Nassir; A. Settari; R. Wan. (2009)
  • A multiphase flow approach to modelling sand production using finite elements. Y. Liu; R. G. Wan; J. Wang. (2004)
  • Prediction and optimization of fracturing in tight gas and shale using a coupled geomechanical model of combined tensile and shear fracturing. R. Wan; A. Settari; M. Nassir. (2012)
  • Analysis of sand production in unconsolidated oil sand using a coupled erosional-stress-deformation model. J. Wang; R. G. Wan. (2001)
  • A microstructural cluster-based description of diffuse and localized failures. F. Darve; F. Bourrier; F. Nicot; R. Wan; L. Sibille; N. Hadda. (2015)
  • Description of brittle-ductile behaviour of rocks using a dilatancy damage model. P. J. Guo; R. G. Wan. (1997)
  • Laboratory and constitutive modeling of Colorado shale at high pressure and temperature. M. Mohamadi; X. Gong; R. G. Wan. (2013)
  • Coupled fluid flow-thermoplastic deformation of oil sand and shale in SAGD process. X. Gong; R. Wan; M. Mohamadi. (2013)
  • Technical session ld: Modeling. R. Wan. (2005)
  • Sand production and instability analysis in a wellbore using a fully coupled reservoir-geomechanics model. J. Wang; Y. N. Liu; R. G. Wan; D. Walters; A. Settari. (2004)
  • Effects of foamy oil and geomechanics on cold production. R. G. Wan; Z. Jian; Y. Liu. (2006)
  • A critical plane approach to anisotropic strength of rocks. M. Pouragha; F. Nicot; R. Wan. (2011)
  • Directional plastic flow and fabric dependencies in granular materials. B. Harthong; R. G. Wan. (2013)
  • The numerical modelling of the development of shear bands in geomechanics. D. H. Chan; N. R. Morgenstern; R. G. Wan. 319-329. (1989)
  • Prediction of SRV and optimization of fracturing in tight gas and shale using a fully elasto-plastic coupled geomechanical model. M. Nassir; A. Settari; R. Wan. (2013)
  • Prediction of volumetric sand production and wellbore stability analysis of a well at different completion schemes. A. Settari; J. Wang; R. G. Wan; D. Walters. (2005)
  • Modelling sand production within a continuum mechanics framework. R. G. Wan; J. Wang. (2000)
  • An integrated modular approach to modeling sand production and cavity growth with emphasis on the multiphase flow and 3D effects. R. G. Wan; A. Settari; D. Walters; J. Wang. (2006)
  • Experimental and constitutive study of the thermo-mechanical behavior of an oil sand. R. G. Wan; M. Mohamadi; E. Piotrowska. (2016)
  • DEM modelling in geomechanics: Some recent breakthroughs. F. Darve; R. Wan; J. Duriez. (2017)
  • Modelling of sand production and wormhole propagation in an oil saturated sand pack using stabilized finite element methods. R. G. Wan; J. Wang. (2002)
  • Criterion for crack initiation in brittle rock under pore pressure elevation. R. G. Wan; R.C.K. Wong; D. W. Eaton; C. K. Wong; B. Li. 1-10. (2018)
  • Micromechanical formulation of stress dilatancy and its implications on the flow rule. F. Darve; F. Nicot; R. G. Wan. (2007)
  • How do fabric and dilatancy affect the strength of granular materials. P. J. Guo; R. G. Wan; M . Al-Mamun. (2005)
  • Technical session 1d: Modeling. T. Noda; R. Wan; F. Molenkamp. (2005)
  • Non-Dissipative Structural Evolutions in Granular Materials. R. Wan; M. Pouragha. 1-4. (2017)
  • A finite element study of localized and diffuse deformations in sand based on a density-stress-fabric dependent elastoplastic model. M. Pinheiro; R. G. Wan. (2009)
  • Effective stress in unsaturated granular materials: Micro-mechanical insights. R. Wan; J. Duriez. (2015)
  • A Three-Scale Description of Partially-Saturated Swelling Clays Based on Micro-Poro-Elasticity. M. Eghbalian; R. G. Wan. (2017)
  • Computations of plastic flow in granular assemblies under rotation of principal stresses. R. Wan; M. Pouragha; N. Hadda. (2015)
  • Modeling shear dominated hydraulic fracturing as a coupled fluid-solid interaction. R. Wan; M. Nassir; A. Settari. (2010)
  • Physical modelling on buried pipeline response in elastoviscoplastic soils. R. G. Wan; B. Liu; R. Wong; C. K. Wong. (2016)
  • A consistent framework with embedded microstructural considerations for stress-dilatancy behaviour of sands. R. G. Wan; P. J. Guo. (1999)
  • Finite element analysis of geomechanical failure during heat stimulation processes in heavy oil recovery. N. Hadda; X. Gong; R. Wan. (2015)
  • A microstructural plastic potential for granular materials. N. Hadda; R. Wan; M. Pouragha. (2015)
  • Effect of soil displacement rate and complex loading on soil-pipe interaction -A physical prototype model. R. G. Wan; C. K. Wong; R.C.K. Wong. (2017)
  • Micromechanical investigation of a 2-D granular material with respect to structure evolution and loading paths. P. J. Guo; R. G. Wan; Al-Mamun. (2004)
  • Partially Saturated Granular Materials: Insights from Micro-Mechanical Modelling. M. Pouragha; J. Duriez; R. Wan. (2017)
  • Influence of structuration on the critical state friction angle: An elastoplastic description. M. Mohamadi; R. G. Wan. (2015)
  • Micromechanical analysis of stress in an unsaturated granular medium. F. Nicot; S. Khosravani; R. Wan. (2011)
  • Granular ratcheting phenomena behind a model retaining wall. G. Zorzi; F. Gabrieli; R. Wan. (2015)

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