ABSTRACT
A direct approach of coupling the element-free Galerkin method and the boundary element method is presented to investigate the dynamic response of a two-dimensional halfspace. The near field around the transient load is discretized by element-free Galerkin nodes also being able to take into account nonlinear effects, while the far field is modeled by linear boundary elements in order to simulate the radiation conditions at infinity. Ensuring compatibility and equilibrium, the two parts are coupled along their common interfaces, and the resulting system of equations is solved using iterative procedures. It is shown that this methodology is efficient and turns out to be a good alternative to classical methods for complex soil–structure interaction problems.