Staff profile

Giuliano Pretti is a PDRA in the Department of Engineering at Durham University, focusing on computational mechanics. Before coming to Durham for his PhD programme, he received an MS (cum laude) in Civil Engineering at the University of Brescia in 2018. As part of his Master's thesis, he developed theoretical studies for non-linear constitutive relationships. His current research focuses on the use of the Material Point Method for poro-mechanics and contact problems.

Conference Paper

• Pretti, G., Coombs, W., & Augarde, C. (2022, April). A comparison of approaches for modelling poro-mechanics in the Material Point Method. Paper presented at UKACM 2022, Nottingham, UK
• Bird, R., Pretti, G., Coombs, W. M., Augarde, C. E., Sharif, Y., Brown, M., Carter, G., & Johnson, K. (2023, April). Cone penetration tests (CPTs) in bi-phase soils: A material point approach with rigid body interaction. Paper presented at UK Association for Computational Mechanics 2023 (UKACM 2023), University of Warwick, UK
• Pretti, G., Coombs, W., Augarde, C., Puigvert, M., Gutierrez, J., & Cross, L. (2022, August). A review of drag anchor penetration models to inform cable burial risk assessment. Paper presented at 4th International Symposium on Frontiers in Offshore Geotechnics (ISFOG), Austin, Texas
• Pretti, G., Coombs, W. M., & Augarde, C. E. (2024, April). Consequences of Terzaghi’s effective stress decomposition in the context of finite strain poro-mechanics. Presented at 2024 UK Association for Computational Mechanics Conference, Durham, UK
• Bird, R., Pretti, G., Coombs, W., Augarde, C., Sharif, Y., Brown, M., Carter, G., Macdonald, C., & Johnson, K. (2024, April). Dynamic three-dimensional rigid body interaction with highly deformable solids, a material point approach. Presented at UK Association for Computational Mechanics Conference 2024, Durham, UK

Journal Article

• Pretti, G., Bird, R., Gavin, N., Coombs, W., & Augarde, C. (in press). A stable poro-mechanical formulation for Material Point Methods leveraging overlapping meshes and multi-field ghost penalisation. International Journal for Numerical Methods in Engineering,
• Bird, R., Pretti, G., Coombs, W., Augarde, C., Sharif, Y., Brown, M., Carter, G., Macdonald, C., & Johnson, K. (2024). An implicit material point-to-rigid body contact approach for large deformation soil-structure interaction. Computers and Geotechnics, 174, Article 106646. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compgeo.2024.106646
• Gavin, N., Pretti, G., Coombs, W., Brigham, J., & Augarde, C. (2024). On the implementation of a material point‐based arc‐length method. International Journal for Numerical Methods in Engineering, 125(9), Article e7438. https://doi.org/10.1002/nme.7438
• Pretti, G., Coombs, W., Augarde, C., Marchena Puigvert, M., & Reyna Gutierrez, J. A. (2024). Preserving non-negative porosity values in a bi-phase elasto-plastic material under Terzaghi’s effective stress principle. Mechanics of Materials, 192, Article 104958. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.mechmat.2024.104958
• Pretti, G., Coombs, W., Augarde, C., Sims, B., Puigvert, M., & Gutierrez, J. (2023). A conservation law consistent updated Lagrangian material point method for dynamic analysis. Journal of Computational Physics, 485, Article 112075. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jcp.2023.112075
• Pretti, G., Coombs, W., & Augarde, C. (2022). A Displacement-controlled Arc-Length Solution Scheme. Computers and Structures, 258, Article 106674. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compstruc.2021.106674