Improvement of mass source/sink for an immersed boundary method

An improved immersed boundary method using a mass source/sink as well as momentum forcing is developed for simulating flows over or inside complex geometries. The present method is based on the Navier–Stokes solver adopting the fractional step method and a staggered Cartesian grid system. A more accurate formulation of the mass source/sink is derived by considering mass conservation of the virtual cells in the fluid crossed by the immersed boundary. Two flow problems (the decaying vortex problem and uniform flow past a circular cylinder) are used to validate the proposed formulation. The results indicate that the accuracy near the immersed boundary is improved by introducing the accurate mass source/sink. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.