Problematic Soils and Geoenvironmental Concerns

Dr. G. Madhavi Latha is a Professor in the Department of Civil Engineering, Indian Institute of Science (IISc) Bangalore, India. She completed her Ph.D. from Indian Institute of Technology Madras, and has previously worked as a post-doctoral fellow and assistant professor at IISc and IIT Guwahati respectively. Professor Latha is a member of various professional bodies including IGS, ISSMGE and ISRM, and is the Editor-in-Chief of the Indian Geotechnical Journal, and an Editorial board member in many reputed journals. Her research work focuses on fundamental aspects of soil and ground reinforcement, and she has authored 70 journal articles, 4 book chapters and has developed a web-course on Geotechnical Earthquake Engineering on the NPTEL platform, sponsored by the Ministry of Human Resources Development, Government of India.Dr. P Raghuveer Rao is Principal Research Scientist at Department of Civil Engineering and involved in teaching, research and consultancy inthe broad area of geotechnical engineering. He has been working with the department since 1989 and has been teaching courses related to subsurface exploration and soil testing, Earth retaining structures, behavior and testing of unsaturated soils, and fundamental of soil behavior for Masters and Doctoral students. His research interests are geotechnical instrumentation, slope stability analysis, numerical modelling, mechanics of unsaturated soils, contaminant transport through soil and reinforced earth structures. He has conducted several field and laboratory tests for design of foundations of different structures like buildings, turbo-generator and water tanks. He has analyzed stability of several embankments, tailing dams and stability of large size surge shafts for a hydropower project through numerical modelling and trial wedge method. He has 21 publications in journals and conference proceedings.

• Laboratory Investigations on Geotechnical Properties of Screened Bottom Ash from Two MSW Incineration Plants in Delhi.- Stabilization of Old MSW Landfills Using Reinforced Soil.- Effect of drying and wetting on shear strength of soil.- Influence of the Rate of Construction on the Response of PVD Improved Soft Ground.- Influence of cement clinker and GGBS on the strength of dispersive soil.- Permeability Index of mechanically biologically treated waste and its application in bioreactor landfills.- Effect of Ethanol on Compressibility, Swelling and Permeability characteristics of Bentonite-Sand mixtures.- Characterization of Heavy Metals from Coal Gangue.- Critical Review for Utilization of Blast furnace slag in Geotechnical Application.