2021 Faculty Courses School of Environment and Society Undergraduate major in Architecture and Building Engineering
Geotechnical Engineering
- Academic unit or major
- Undergraduate major in Architecture and Building Engineering
- Instructor(s)
- Shuji Tamura
- Class Format
- Lecture
- Media-enhanced courses
- -
- Day of week/Period
(Classrooms) - 5-6 Tue (W351) / 5-6 Fri (S421)
- Class
- -
- Course Code
- ARC.S304
- Number of credits
- 200
- Course offered
- 2021
- Offered quarter
- 1Q
- Syllabus updated
- Jul 10, 2025
- Language
- Japanese
Syllabus
Course overview and goals
This course focuses on geotechnical engineering, immediate settlements, consolidation settlements, shear strength of soil, earth pressure and covers fundamentals of the design of shallow foundations and pile foundations.
This course facilitates students’ ability to design building foundations
Course description and aims
At the end of this course, students will be able to:
1) Explain soil mechanical, earth pressure, mechanism of settlement of shallow foundations and landslide.
2) Have an understanding of design of building foundations and retaining structures.
Keywords
Geotechnical engineering, Building foundations, Consolidation settlements
Competencies
- Specialist skills
- Intercultural skills
- Communication skills
- Critical thinking skills
- Practical and/or problem-solving skills
Class flow
Towards the end of class, students are given exercise problems related to what is taught on that day to solve.
Course schedule/Objectives
| Course schedule | Objectives | |
|---|---|---|
| Class 1 | Overview of geotechnical engineering |
Understand the soil conditions at Tokyo area. |
| Class 2 | Principle in soil mechanics |
Basic principle in soil mechanical such as weight and density of soil. |
| Class 3 | Principle of effective stress |
Basic principle in soil mechanical such as effective stress. |
| Class 4 | Elastic stress-strain relation and elastic boundary-value problems |
Stress resulting from the boundary-value problem such as vertical point force on the ground surface. |
| Class 5 | Immediate settlement |
Understand settlement equations from elasticity theory. |
| Class 6 | Mechanism of consolidation settlement |
Understand settlement equations from consolidation theory. |
| Class 7 | Evaluation of consolidation settlement |
Understand evaluation of settlement from consolidation |
| Class 8 | Shear strength of soil |
Understand stress-strain behavior and shear strength of soil. |
| Class 9 | Bearing capacity of shallow foundations |
Understand mechanism of bearing capacity of shallow foundation. |
| Class 10 | Earth pressure |
Understand active and passive erath pressure. |
| Class 11 | Pile load capacity |
Design of vertical load capacity of piles |
| Class 12 | Lateral resistance of piles |
Design of lateral resistance of piles |
| Class 13 | Retaining structure |
Design of retaining structure. |
| Class 14 | Slope stability |
Understand mechansm of landslide. |
| Class 15 | Soil liquefacion and eartquake disaster |
How to mitigate earthquake damage based on geotechnical engineering. |
Study advice (preparation and review)
To enhance effective learning, students are encouraged to spend approximately 100 minutes preparing for class and another 100 minutes reviewing class content afterwards (including assignments) for each class.
They should do so by referring to textbooks and other course material.
Textbook(s)
Course materials are provided during class
Reference books, course materials, etc.
1) All materials used in class can be found on OCW-i.
2) Course materials are provided during class
Evaluation methods and criteria
Students’ course scores are based on final exams (60%) and exercise problems (40%).
Related courses
- ARC.S303 ： Structural Design III
Prerequisites
No prerequisites.