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Affected by climatic conditions such as rainfall, evaporation and air temperature, most of the backfill soil is in an unsaturated state, and the decrease in matric suction leads to the failure of the retaining structure. In view of this, this study takes the vertical rigid retaining wall with narrow unsaturated backfill as the research object, assuming that the backfill behind the wall forms a circular soil arch and considering the interlayer shear stress; thus, the analytical solution of the active earth pressure of narrow unsaturated soil is derived based on the thin layer element method. The reliability of this method is verified by comparing with the experimental and existing theoretical results. A parameter analysis demonstrates that with the increase in the interface friction angle of the moving wall–soil, the average shear stress coefficient of zone I and zone II increases gradually, but with the increase in the interface friction angle of the fixed wall–soil, the average shear stress coefficient of zone I decreases; with the increase in effective internal friction angle and effective cohesion, the active earth pressure decreases and the tension crack depth increases; with the increase in the interface friction angle, the active earth pressure in the upper part of the retaining wall increases slightly, while the active earth pressure in the lower part decreases obviously; with the increase in matric suction, the active earth pressure first decreases rapidly and then increases gradually, and the tension crack depth first increases and then decreases, but the distribution pattern of the horizontal active earth pressure remains unchanged; the active earth pressure decreases with the decrease in the aspect ratio, and when the aspect ratio is smaller, the attenuation is more obvious; until the aspect ratio reaches a certain value, the active earth pressure is basically unchanged. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Four sampling techniques, solid-phase microextraction (SPME), supercritical fluid extraction (SFE), steam distillation (SD), and solvent extraction (SE), were compared for the analysis of volatile constituents from a traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) of the dried ripe fruit of Fructus Amomi (Sha Ren). A total of 38 compounds were identified by gas chromatography/mass spectrometry. Different SFE and SPME parameters (modifier content, extraction pressure, and temperature for SFE and fibers, extraction temperature, and time for SPME) were studied. The results by SFE and SPME were compared with those obtained by conventional SD and SE methods. The results showed that SFE and SPME are better sample preparation techniques than SD and SE. Due to SFE's requirement for expensive specialized instrumentation, the simplicity, low cost, and speed of SPME make it a more appropriate technique for extraction of volatile constituents in TCMs.