Paper Abstract - International Conference on Coastal Engineering (ICCE) 2008, Hamburg, Germany EXPERIMENTAL AND NUMERICAL STUDY OF THE RESPONSE OF A SANDBED BENEATH A CAISSON BREAKWATER SUBJECT TO CYCLIC WAVE LOAD

The foundation design of marine structures is one of the most demanding tasks for coastal or geotechnical engineers. Due to the dynamic and cyclic loading conditions a variety of governing processes have to be considered, some of them beeing difficult to assess. Furthermore, the determination of relevant loading parameters and dynamic response parameters of the structures and their foundations is often imprecise. The quality of the results is also determined by the soil model used to describe the response of the subsoil. All these will affect an adequate assessment of the overall stability. In view of the considerable costs of breakwaters, it is obvious to optimize the design process. For this purpose, it is important to improve the knowledge of the processes involved, to assess more precisely the quantitative influence of crucial parameters and to select an appropriate constitutive law for the calculations.