ABSTRACT
Concrete pavements are often idealized as beams or plates on elastic foundation. Numerous hypothetical springs placed at the bottom of this beam/plate represent the elastic foundation for such models. Modulus of subgrade reaction seems to be the function of the dimension of the foundation, and hence non-unique. Discrepancies in the deflection values have been observed between the field results and model predictions, these idealized springs being mutually independent members. There are a large number of various such models of beams on elastic foundation and varieties of solution techniques proposed and studied by various researchers. Concrete slabs are generally idealized as thin plate resting on elastic foundation. In the following, the theory of thin plates resting on elastic foundation has been presented. Researchers have provided solutions for thick and thin plates with various foundations, for example, thick plate resting on Pasternak foundation, thick plate resting on Winkler's foundation, thin plate resting on Kerr foundation and various other boundary and foundation conditions.
