Preface of the special issue on ‘poromechanics in honour of Arnold Verruijt’

Abstract

The mechanics of porous media has been an important branch of mechanics, in particular of geomechanics, since the seminal works of Karl Terzaghi and, later, Maurice Biot. Originally, the area of application was primarily geotechnical engineering. More recently, applications in biomechanics, and in petroleum engineering, have given a new impetus to the research on fluid-saturated porous media. The latter field of application is clearly within the interest of the International Journal for Numerical and Analytical Methods in Geomechanics, and the editors have decided to devote a special issue on poromechanics to emphasize the importance of the field in geomechanics and to highlight the challenges and complexity of the mechanics of (partially) fluid-saturated porous media, in particular the multi-scale, multiphysics, and free-boundary problems that are encountered. The articles in this special issue present a beautiful overview of various aspects of these difficulties. The wish to publish a special issue on recent issues in poromechanics coincided with the desire to honor Arnold Verruijt following the conferral to him of the 2014 American Association of Civil Engineers (ASCE) Maurice A. Biot Medal for his pioneering contributions to the theory of poroelasticity and the development of original analytical and numerical methods for solving problems of poroelasticity in soil mechanics and groundwater flow. A founding member of the editorial board of this journal, Arnold Verruijt, is a preeminent scholar in the field of poroelasticity and a pioneer in applying the theory of poroelasticity to groundwater aquifers before anyone else recognized its importance. Generations of students and researchers were inspired by his work, not the least through his great didactic gifts. His work, for instance, was applied to many land subsidence problems because of water, oil, and gas extraction. Other fields where he has made seminal contributions are the Noordbergsum effect (the phenomenon of water level initially rising, instead of falling, in neighboring observation wells when a well is being pumped) and the application of numerical (in particular finite element) methods to (un)confined seepage and poroelasticity, where he also worked hard to get these methods accepted in the geotechnical engineering community. Arnold Verruijt has also shown an active involvement in a range of administrative matters at Delft University of Technology, his alma mater, and the university that he served for more than 30 years as a professor and was, for instance, also chairman of the Committee on Engineering Education of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences, where he has been a member since 1991. For this, and other services, he was knighted in 1997 as an officer in the Royal Order of Oranje-Nassau. Last but not the least, Arnold Verruijt always kept a firm foot in engineering practice. The list of important projects in which he has been involved is impressive, ranging from the Eastern Scheldt Surge Barrier in the south–west of the Netherlands, to the effects of gas extraction in the Waddenzee, and is a clear testimony that he is also a great and much sought-after engineer.