ABSTRACT
The work at hand explores a dynamic arbitrary Lagrangian Eulerian (ALE) framework for the finite element (FE) simulation of pavement structures. Such a framework is particularly useful in the context of a digital twin, because several simulations would need to be run to identify relevant parameters of the twin that match reality. Conventional Lagrangian FE simulation methods would not be feasible from a computational effort standpoint, because the entire length of the pavement in the path of the moving wheel loads would need to be discretized and simulated. On the other hand, with the ALE framework, only a relevant region around the applied wheel load would need to be discretized, and this is more efficient. The obtained results show that the ALE framework is capable of matching the accuracy of conventional simulation methods, while also being significantly faster.
