Aeolian sand exhibits considerable strength when dry and experiences sudden settling when submerged. To study its deformation behavior after immersion in water, a series of oedometric compression tests, isotropic compression tests, and triaxial compression tests were conducted on dry and wet aeolian sand based upon the single-line and double-line methods. The experimental results demonstrate that the wetting axial and volumetric deformation depend on confining pressure, relative density, and wetting stress level. The mechanism of wetting deformation is that the water immersion weakens the particle strength, causing surface lubrication and rearrangement, resulting in a sudden decrease in their void ratio. Furthermore, the state boundary surface of dry and wet specimens was obtained in three-dimensional (average principal stress, deviatoric stress, and void ratio) space. It is evident that the state boundary surface shrinks after wetting. These findings contribute to a better understanding of wetting deformation and provide better references for addressing deformation issues caused by wetting in subgrade construction and other geotechnical or geoenvironments.
Ma et al. (2026) studied this question.