SPECIAL FEATURE STORY ON “Soil Mechanics at Emmanuel College – Elegant, Rigorous and Relevant”

Abstract

This paper was first presented by the author as a lecture at Emmanuel College, Cambridge in 2005 and was published in the College Magazine. Intended for non-experts it celebrates the contributions made to Soil Mechanics by Professor Ken Roscoe and many of his students at Emmanuel College. The author had the good fortune to be at Cambridge under Roscoe’s supervision at a very important time when the basic concepts of Critical State Soil Mechanics were being developed. The paper focuses as much on the personalities of the key players as on their technical contributions.