Thedisintegration of mudstone particlesunder the action of dry and wet cycling was studied through laboratory tests.The basic entropy was used to quantify the fragmentation degree of mudstone particles under the action of dry and wet cycling

and the variation of soil gradation duringdry and wet cycling was analyzed.The concept of crushing potential was introduced to quantify the impact of the overburden and the content of coarse particles on the disintegration and breakage of mudstone particles.The results show that:the disintegration process mainly concentrates in the first four cycles

in which the particle disintegration and breakage are the most severe under 2-4 cycles of drying and wetting.After 9 cycles of drying and wetting

the mudstone samples change from continuous gradation to non-continuous gradation.Crushing potential could be used to quantify the probability of disintegration and breakage of mudstone particles before and after dry-wet cycling.Total breakage rate could quantitatively describe the proportion ofthe possible breakage particles to the broken particles.