Increased water content in rocks can result in a decline in their strength and an increase in deformation, which can lead to geological disasters such as landslides and tunnel collapses. Hence, rock characteristics with respect to water content need to be investigated for the purposes of conducting risk assessments and implementing preventive measures. In this study, the influence of the water content on rock failure patterns and acoustic emission (AE) characteristics was investigated. Uniaxial compression tests and numerical simulations with the PFC^2D software were used to study the evolution process of microcracks and failure patterns in red sandstones with different water contents. The increases in the water content reduced the rock strength, Young's modulus, ratio of strain to peak strain in the elastic deformation stage, maximum energy of a single AE event, and average AE energy. The red sandstone specimens in the saturated state formed a shear macroscopic fracture surface, whereas those in the natural state formed a failure pattern in which shear failures and splitting failures coexisted. The red sandstone failure pattern in the dry state remained between these two conditions. The average frequency centroid of AEs revealed the precursory characteristics for critical failures of red sandstone with different water contents. The findings of this study are useful for future risk assessment and disaster prevention studies.

岩石中含水量的增加会导致其强度下降和变形增加，从而导致诸如滑坡和隧道坍塌等地质灾害。因此，出于进行风险评估和采取预防措施的目的，需要研究岩石中与水含量有关的特性。在这项研究中，研究了含水量对岩石破坏模式和声发射（AE）特性的影响。利用PFC ^2D软件进行单轴压缩测试和数值模拟，研究了红砂岩中微裂纹和破坏模式的演化过程。有不同的水含量。含水量的增加降低了岩石强度，杨氏模量，弹性变形阶段的应变与峰值应变之比，单个AE事件的最大能量以及平均AE能量。饱和状态下的红砂岩试样形成了剪切宏观断裂面，而自然状态下的红砂岩试样形成了剪切破坏和劈裂破坏并存的破坏模式。处于干燥状态的红砂岩破坏模式保持在这两个条件之间。声发射的平均频率质心揭示了不同含水量的红砂岩严重破坏的先兆特征。这项研究的结果对于将来的风险评估和灾难预防研究很有用。