Scientific Reports (Apr 2024)

Experimental test and mechanism analysis of soil crust erosion resistance of rammed earth Great Wall in rainy season

  • Liang Liu,
  • Yun Zhang,
  • Lianjun Guo,
  • Haiying Cao,
  • Zhenwei Dai,
  • Zhiyong Zhao,
  • Ying Guo,
  • Dongdong Li,
  • Lingling Zheng,
  • Tianli Li

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-024-59706-z
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 14, no. 1
pp. 1 – 17

Abstract

Read online

Abstract Rammed earth is a kind of cleaning material, widely used in all kinds of buildings in the world. The Great Wall of ancient China is a typical world cultural site built from rammed earth. The rammed earth Great Wall of Shanhaiguan is close to Bohai Bay, which has suffered from long-term erosion by rain, causing a series of problems such as soil loss, collapse and gully flushing. The protection materials of the rammed earth site have always puzzled scholars. However, during the rainy season, it was found that some of the walls at Xiaowan Gouge and Nantuzhuang Gouge in the Shanhaiguan Great Wall had unwashed traces, the soil surface of the walls was intact, and the anti-erosion ability of the walls was significantly higher than that of other places. In order to explore the reasons for its strong anti-erosion ability in the natural state of rammed earth wall, guide the protection of rammed earth Great Wall, and carry out different experimental tests to explore its anti-erosion reasons and internal mechanisms. Firstly, the characteristics of rammed soil were understood through the composition test of rammed soil, and the indoor and outdoor erosion test was carried out to determine that the anti-erosion reason was the protection of gray-green soil crust. The property and composition of soil crust were determined through the immersion test and genome sequencing. Finally, the protection mechanism of soil crust was analyzed by scanning electron microscopy.

Keywords