Stabilization of Earthen Building Materials by Select Native Binders

Chapter 1: Characterization of soils used in earthen building materials.- Chapter 2: Role of soil suction in the engineering behavior of earthen building materials.- Chapter 3: Stabilizers for earthen building materials.- Chapter 4: Characteristics of cement stabilized and cement +wood ash stabilized compressed earth blocks.-  Chapter 5: Stabilization of adobes by plant fibers.- Chapter 6: Stabilization of adobes by cow dung particles.- Chapter 7: General conclusions.

Dr. Sudhakar Rao is a Retired Professor from Department of Civil Engineering, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore. His major research contributions are on elucidating the role of suction, climate and physico-chemical forces in the mechanical response of unsaturated and saturated soils, use of native binders in stabilization of raw earth, and re-use of wastes in civil engineering applications, such as the use of fly ash in synthesis of geopolymer sands. He has designed and taught undergraduate and graduate level courses in environmental sciences and geoenvironmental engineering. He was a Principal Investigator of several Sponsored Research Projects that focused on indigenous earth deposits stabilized with native binders, design of clay barriers to contain hazardous wastes and re-use of hazardous wastes, such as phosphogypsum sludge, bone char sludge and fluoride contaminated magnesia in civil engineering applications. He has published more than 100 papers in leading International Journals and has supervised 24 Ph.D. and 7 M.Sc. (Engineering) dissertations. He has co-edited one book and has contributed chapters to five edited books. He is serving as the associate editor of two journals and the editorial board member of one journal.  He was a visiting scientist at McGill University, Ryerson University, Canada and Cardiff University, UK.