Prediction of Collapsibility of Loess of Construction Sites in Xining Based on Machine Learning Methods
Abstract Collapsibility of loess is a significant factor affecting engineering construction in loess area, and testing the collapsibility of loess is costly. In this study, A total of 4,256 loess samples are collected from the north, east, west and middle regions of Xining. 70% of the samples are used to generate training data set, and the rest are used to generate verification data set, so as to construct and validate the machine learning models. The most important six factors are selected from thirteen factors by using Grey Relational analysis and multicollinearity analysis: burial depth、water content、specific gravity of soil particles、void rate、geostatic stress and plasticity limit. In order to predict the collapsibility of loess, four machine learning methods: Support Vector Machine (SVM), Random Subspace Based Support Vector Machine (RSSVM), Random Forest (RF) and Naïve Bayes Tree (NBTree), are studied and compared. The receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve indicators, standard error (SD) and 95% confidence interval (CI) are used to verify and compare the models in different research areas. The results show that: RF model is the most efficient in predicting the collapsibility of loess in Xining, and its AUC average is above 80%, which can be used in engineering practice.