Characterizing Physical and Hydrotechnical Properties of Sediments Surrounding Soap Hole Features Near Didsbury, Alberta, Canada
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Soap holes are discrete occurrences of fluidized sediments that have been reduced to zero effective stress resulting in quick conditions. These features can be detrimental to farming operations through evaporitic concentration of ions in surface sediments surrounding the features or by fatally trapping livestock. Currently, the sediment properties and subsurface conditions required to generate soap holes are relatively unknown. A site investigation conducted near Didsbury, Alberta, analyzed the geologic, hydrogeologic and geotechnical conditions surrounding four active soap hole features to improve the understanding of soap hole formation. Glacially derived surface sediments and Paskapoo formation bedrock were extensively analyzed using a combination electrical resistivity tomography (ERT), cone penetration testing (CPT), and sediment coring and sampling. Laboratory analyses were completed on recovered sediment samples to determine index properties, particle-size distribution, Atterberg consistency limits, dispersive properties and chemical composition. ERT transects indicated there are three distinct sedimentary units on-site, and bedrock depth of approximately 11-mbgs, which was confirmed by drilling. Near-surface sediments are primarily comprised of non-sensitive, over-consolidated fine-grained material, with medium to high plasticity, and are highly dispersive. Discontinuous coarse-grains sediments were also noted in the sediment core, potentially providing flow-paths through the extensive fine-grained sediments. Hydrogeologic conditions were analyzed utilizing pressure transducer data, manual water level measurements, CPT correlations, and single well response tests. Artesian conditions were confirmed within a soap hole feature that was instrumented on site and are suspected to persist in the surrounding features. Pore pressures within and below the instrumented feature correlate with regional potentiometric surface maps of the Paskapoo formation, suggesting hydraulic connection to deep groundwater flow-paths. Strong upward vertical gradients (>1-m/m) within the soap hole feature exceed the critical gradient of surrounding sediments. Downward vertical gradients less than critical were found in most background sediments surrounding the features. Overall, sediments at the study site did not have properties indicative of being prone to liquefication. However, results suggest that high pore pressures, dispersive soils and vertical hydraulic gradients exceeding sediment critical gradients are some of the primary formation mechanisms of the soap hole features.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.002 | 0.001 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Open science | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Research integrity | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".