The Department of Geology at the College of Science organized a panel discussion entitled (Geotechnical and mineral assessment of the soils of the cities of Al-Ashar and Al-Hartha in Basra, southern Iraq). The seminar, in which the researcher Saja Nasih Salman gave a lecture, aims to evaluate the geotechnical and mineral properties of selected soils in Al Ashar and Al Hartha and to show the effect of clay minerals on some geotechnical properties and engineering behavior of the soil.

The study included conducting many on-site, geotechnical and mineral examinations of the soil of the two study sites, where the laboratory analysis was conducted in two directions, the first is geotechnical examinations represented in physical and chemical analyses, and the second is mineral analysis using X-ray diffraction (XRD) to diagnose clay and non-clay minerals.

The results revealed that all soils of the Al-Ashar site and 80% of Al-Hartha soil are classified as highly compressive soils. In addition, it is considered to have a medium to high swelling effort at the Al-Ashar site, while the swelling effort is low to medium at the Al-Hartha site. The results of mineral analysis by X-ray diffraction (XRD) system showed that the predominant non-clay minerals are Calcite and Quartz, followed by Dolomite, Feldspar, and Halite in lesser proportions. The predominant clay minerals are montmorillonite and Kaolinite, followed by Chlorite, Montmorillonite-chlorite, Illite, and Palygorskite in lesser proportions. Thus, the high proportions of Montmorillonite mineral are responsible for the swelling in these soils, and this justifies the high compressibility of the soil in both locations.