Stability analysis for natural slope by kinematical approach

The stability of natural slope was analyzed on the basis of limit analysis. The sliding model of a kind of natural slope was presented. A new kinematically admissible velocity field for the new sliding model was constructed. The stability factor formulation by the upper bound theorem leads to a classical nonlinear programming problem, when the external work rate and internal energy dissipation were solved, and the constraint condition of the programming problem was given. The upper bound optimization problem can be solved efficiently by applying a nonlinear SQP algorithm, and stability factor was obtained, which agrees well with previous achievements.