Amir Javaid, a PhD candidate under the supervision of Prof. John Harrison, and co-authors were awarded the CARMA 2023 Best Paper award in Rock Mechanics or Rock Engineering.
The award was presented at GeoSaskatoon 2023 conference organized by the Canadian Rock Mechanics Association (CARMA) and the Canadian Geotechnical Society (CGS) in October 2023. Authors of the paper, Analyzing in situ stress: challenges in quantifying stress domains, include Javaid, Prof. Harrison, Dr. Hossein Kasani (NWMO) and Dr. Diego Mas Ivars (SKB Sweden).
Javaid is conducting his PhD research on characterization of in situ stress using Bayesian methods. Their paper presents a novel approach for quantifying uncertainty in stress domain boundaries using Bayesian segmented linear regression of overcoring stress data against depth of measurements.
Currently, there is a lack of robust and universally agreed methods for objectively characterizing the variability in in situ stress and this task is critical to the design of sensitive structures such as nuclear waste repositories. Javaid’s research is a significant development for the use of novel methods and techniques for characterization of in situ stress for the design of nuclear waste repositories.