Dynamic properties of sandy soil under medium-high strain rates are of great significance for protection engineering, pile penetration, ship anchoring, aircraft landing, and so on. This paper reviews the current research status of split Hopkinson pressure bar (SHPB) impact tests and numerical simulations on sandy soil. The key issues in the research of sandy soil impact characteristics are summarized as follows: (1) The SHPB test still faces uncertainties for granular materials, such as the lack of standardized test sample size, difficulties in controlling boundary conditions, and the immaturity of triaxial testing methods. Future triaxial SHPB tests need to address issues related to measuring radial deformation of the samples and maintaining consistent confining pressure. (2) Due to uncertainties in gas and water discharge under test conditions and the presence of inertial effects, the accurate determination of strain rate effects becomes challenging. (3) The impact characteristics of granular materials are influenced by moisture content, which is correlated with changes in pore water pressure and pore air pressure. However, measuring these related variables is difficult, making it challenging to analyze the results. It is necessary to develop a device that completely eliminates the effects of gas and water discharge to mitigate the influence of boundary conditions. (4) To study the impact characteristics of sandy soils, it is necessary to overcome computational limitations and establish numerical models that account for complex mechanisms such as water content and particle fragmentation. Existing methods such as the finite element method, discrete element method, and coupled methods are unable to uniformly simulate the continuity of wave propagation and particle fragmentation. (5) It is crucial to develop constitutive models that consider the strain rate effects and can simulate complex mechanisms such as water content and particle fragmentation. This will help refine the theoretical framework of soil mechanics at medium to high strain rates.

Cushion materials can effectively reduce the impact load acting on the rigid protective structures such as shed tunnel and improve the impact resistance of the structures. In order to investigate the variation of cushioning performance of recycled concrete aggregate (RCA) under successive impacts, drop weight impact tests and discrete element simulations are carried out. Test results show that compared with the quartz sand cushion, the transmitted load at the center of concrete shed for RCA under the first impact reduces by 83%, and it is distributed more uniformly. With the increase in the number of impacts, the cushioning performances of both the RCA and quartz sand deteriorate. For the sixth impact, the maximum transmitted loads at the center of concrete shed for RCA and quartz sand are 11.2 times and 1.4 times those of the first impact, respectively. Furthermore, the cushioning performance is strongly influenced by particle shape. The numerical simulation results show that when the proportion of strip particles increases from 0% to 100%, the rotation angle and translation distance of the particles decrease by 40% and 20%, respectively, and the maximum drop weight impact load increases by 37%. The inter-locking effect between particles increases with the irregularity of particle shape, which limits the rotation and translation of the particles, and increases the drop weight impact load and the transmitted load on the concrete slab. The research results may provide theoretical basis and engineering guidance for RCA as a new type of eco-friendly cushion.