A high‐order element based adaptive mesh refinement strategy for three‐dimensional unstructured grid

Adaptive mesh refinement (AMR) shows attractive properties in automatically refining the flow region of interest, and with AMR, better prediction can be obtained with much less labor work and cost compared to manually remeshing or the global mesh refinement. Cartesian AMR is well established; however, AMR on hybrid unstructured mesh, which is heavily used in the high‐Reynolds number flow simulation, is less matured and existing methods may result in degraded mesh quality, which mostly happens in the boundary layer or near the sharp geometric features. User intervention or additional constraints, such as freezing all boundary layer elements or refining the whole boundary layer, are required to assist the refinement process. In this work, a novel AMR strategy is developed to handle existing difficulties. In the new method, high‐order unstructured elements are first generated based on the baseline mesh; then the refinement is conducted in the parametric space; at last, the mesh suitable for the solver is output. Generating refined elements in the parametric space with high‐order elements is the key of this method and this helps to guarantee both the accuracy and robustness. With the current method, 3‐dimensional hybrid unstructured mesh of huge size and complex geometry can be automatically refined, without user intervention nor additional constraints. With test cases including the 2‐dimensional airfoil and 3‐dimensional full aircraft, the current AMR method proves to be accurate, simple, and robust.     

A high‐order flux reconstruction adaptive mesh refinement method for magnetohydrodynamics on unstructured grids

We report our recent development of the high‐order flux reconstruction adaptive mesh refinement (AMR) method for magnetohydrodynamics (MHD). The resulted framework features a shock‐capturing duo of AMR and artificial resistivity (AR), which can robustly capture shocks and rotational and contact discontinuities with a fraction of the cell counts that are usually required. In our previous paper, 36 we have presented a shock‐capturing framework on hydrodynamic problems with artificial diffusivity and AMR. Our AMR approach features a tree‐free, direct‐addressing approach in retrieving data across multiple levels of refinement. In this article, we report an extension to MHD systems that retains the flexibility of using unstructured grids. The challenges due to complex shock structures and divergence‐free constraint of magnetic field are more difficult to deal with than those of hydrodynamic systems. The accuracy of our solver hinges on 2 properties to achieve high‐order accuracy on MHD systems: removing the divergence error thoroughly and resolving discontinuities accurately. A hyperbolic divergence cleaning method with multiple subiterations is used for the first task. This method drives away the divergence error and preserves conservative forms of the governing equations. The subiteration can be accelerated by absorbing a pseudo time step into the wave speed coefficient, therefore enjoys a relaxed CFL condition. The AMR method rallies multiple levels of refined cells around various shock discontinuities, and it coordinates with the AR method to obtain sharp shock profiles. The physically consistent AR method localizes discontinuities and damps the spurious oscillation arising in the curl of the magnetic field. The effectiveness of the AMR and AR combination is demonstrated to be much more powerful than simply adding AR on finer and finer mesh, since the AMR steeply reduces the required amount of AR and confines the added artificial diffusivity and resistivity to a narrower and narrower region. We are able to verify the designed high‐order accuracy in space by using smooth flow test problems on unstructured grids. The efficiency and robustness of this framework are fully demonstrated through a number of two‐dimensional nonsmooth ideal MHD tests. We also successfully demonstrate that the AMR method can help significantly save computational cost for the Orszag‐Tang vortex problem.     

Adaptive mesh refinement method-based large eddy simulation for the flow over circular cylinder at ReD = 3900

With the development of computational power, large eddy simulation (LES) method is increasingly used in simulating complex flow. However, there still exist many factors affecting the LES quality and appropriate mesh resolution is among one of them. This work aims to develop an automatic procedure to refine the LES mesh by combining adaptive mesh refinement (AMR) and LES quality criteria. An LES refinement criterion is developed by estimating the proper grid length scale which meets the accuracy requirement of LES method. With this criterion, the baseline mesh is automatically refined with the AMR method. In this work, an efficient one-shot refinement strategy is also proposed to reduce the overall simulation time. Current AMR-based LES method is verified with the typical LES test case about the flow past circular cylinder at Re _D = 3900. Results show that the automatically refined mesh provides systematically better agreement with experimental results and with current method the balance between accuracy and computational expense for LES can be obtained.     

A multiblock/multilevel mesh refinement procedure for CFD computations

A multiblock/multilevel algorithm with local refinement for general two‐ and three‐dimensional fluid flow is presented. The patched‐based local refinement procedure is presented in detail and algorithmic implementations are also presented. The multiblock implementation is essentially block‐unstructured, i.e. each block having its own local curvilinear co‐ordinate system. Refined grid patches can be put anywhere in the computational domain and can extend across block boundaries. To simplify the implementation, while still maintaining sufficient generality, the refinement is restricted to a refinement of the grid successively halving the grid size within a selected patch. The multiblock approach is implemented within the framework of the well‐known SIMPLE solution strategy. Computational experiments showing the effect of using the multilevel solution procedure are presented for a sample elliptic problem and a few benchmark problems of computational fluid dynamics (CFD). Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Patched grid and adaptive mesh refinement strategies for the calculation of the transport of vortices

This paper presents two techniques allowing local grid refinement to calculate the transport of vortices. one is the patched grid (PG) method which allows non‐coincident interfaces between blocks. Treatment of the non‐coincident interfaces is given in detail. The second one is the adaptive mesh refinement (AMR) method which has been developed in order to create embedded sub‐grids. The efficiency of these two methods is demonstrated by some validating tests. Then the PG and AMR strategies are applied in the computation of the transport of vortices. We start with a simple vortex flow in a cubic box. Then, the flowfield around a complex aircraft configuration is calculated using the two refinement techniques. Results are compared with a fine, referenced grid calculation. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Validation of adaptive unstructured hexahedral mesh computations of flow around a wind turbine airfoil

In this paper we investigate local adaptive refinement of unstructured hexahedral meshes for computations of the flow around the DU91 wind turbine airfoil. This is a 25% thick airfoil, found at the mid‐span section of a wind turbine blade. Wind turbine applications typically involve unsteady flows due to changes in the angle of attack and to unsteady flow separation at high angles of attack. In order to obtain reasonably accurate results for all these conditions one should use a mesh which is refined in many regions, which is not computationally efficient. Our solution is to apply an automated mesh adaptation technique. In this paper we test an adaptive refinement strategy developed for unstructured hexahedral meshes for steady flow conditions. The automated mesh adaptation is based on local flow sensors for pressure, velocity, density or a combination of these flow variables. This way the mesh is refined only in those regions necessary for high accuracy, retaining computational efficiency. A validation study is performed for two cases: attached flow at an angle of 6° and separated flow at 12°. The results obtained using our adaptive mesh strategy are compared with experimental data and with results obtained with an equally sized non‐adapted mesh. From these computations it can be concluded that for a given computing time, adapted meshes result in solutions closer to the experimental data compared to non‐adapted meshes for attached flow. Finally, we show results for unsteady computations. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Multi‐size‐mesh multi‐time‐step algorithm for noise computation on curvilinear meshes

Aeroacoustic problems are often multi‐scale and a zonal refinement technique is thus desirable to reduce computational effort while preserving low dissipation and low dispersion errors from the numerical scheme. For that purpose, the multi‐size‐mesh multi‐time‐step algorithm of Tam and Kurbatskii [AIAA Journal, 2000, 38 (8), p. 1331–1339] allows changes by a factor of two between adjacent blocks, accompanied by a doubling in the time step. This local time stepping avoids wasting calculation time, which would result from imposing a unique time step dictated by the smallest grid size for explicit time marching. In the present study, the multi‐size‐mesh multi‐time‐step method is extended to general curvilinear grids by using a suitable coordinate transformation and by performing the necessary interpolations directly in the physical space due to multidimensional interpolations combining order constraints and optimization in the wave number space. A particular attention is paid to the properties of the Adams–Bashforth schemes used for time marching. The optimization of the coefficients by minimizing an error in the wave number space rather than satisfying a formal order is shown to be inefficient for Adams–Bashforth schemes. The accuracy of the extended multi‐size‐mesh multi‐time‐step algorithm is first demonstrated for acoustic propagation on a sinusoidal grid and for a computation of laminar trailing edge noise. In the latter test‐case, the mesh doubling is close to the airfoil and the vortical structures are crossing the doubling interface without affecting the quality of the radiated field. The applicability of the algorithm in three dimensions is eventually demonstrated by computing tonal noise from a moderate Reynolds number flow over an airfoil. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A high‐resolution method for compressible two‐fluid flows and simulation of three‐dimensional shock–bubble interactions

A high‐resolution method is developed to capture the material interfaces of compressible two‐fluid flows in multiple dimensions. A fluid mixture model system with single velocity and pressure is used, and viscous effect can also be taken into account. A consistent thermodynamic law based on the assumption of pressure equilibrium is employed to describe the thermodynamic behaviors of the pure fluids and mixture of two components. The splitting and unsplit Eulerian formulations of piecewise parabolic method are extended to numerically integrate the hyperbolic part of the model system, whereas the system of diffusion equations is solved using an explicit, central difference scheme. The block‐structured adaptive mesh refinement (AMR) capability is built in the hydrodynamic code to locally improve grid resolution. The resulting method is verified to be at least second‐order accurate in space. Numerical results show that the discontinuities, particularly contact discontinuities, can be resolved sharply. The use of AMR allows flow features at disparate scales to be resolved sufficiently. In addition, three‐dimensional shock–bubble interactions are simulated to investigate effects of Mach number on bubble evolution. The flow structures including those peculiar to three‐dimensional bubble are resolved correctly, and some physical phenomena with increasing Mach number are reported. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Mono‐block and non‐matching multi‐block structured mesh adaptation based on aerodynamic functional total derivatives for RANS flow

An enhanced goal‐oriented mesh adaptation method is presented based on aerodynamic functional total derivatives with respect to mesh nodes in a Reynolds‐Averaged Navier‐Stokes (RANS) finite‐volume mono‐block and non‐matching multi‐block‐structured grid framework. This method falls under the category of methods involving the adjoint vector of the function of interest. The contribution of a Spalart–Allmaras turbulence model is taken into account through its linearization. Meshes are adapted accordingly to the proposed indicator. Applications to 2D RANS flow about a RAE2822 airfoil in transonic, and detached subsonic conditions are presented for the drag coefficient estimation. The asset of the proposed method is patent. The obtained 2D anisotropic mono‐block mesh well captures flow features as well as global aerodynamic functionals. Interestingly, the constraints imposed by structured grids may be relaxed by the use of non‐matching multi‐block approach that limits the outward propagation of local mesh refinement through all of the computational domain. The proposed method also leads to accurate results for these multi‐block meshes but at a fraction of the cost. Finally, the method is also successfully applied to a more complex geometry, namely, a mono‐block mesh in a 3D RANS transonic flow about an M6 wing. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

On the performance of adaptive mesh refinement computation

A finite difference scheme for the unsteady Euler equations using an adaptive mesh refinement (AMR) algorithm was applied to the time-dependent flowfield of shock diffraction problems. The effectiveness of the AMR algorithm was evaluated against a uniform mesh algorithm. Computational results showed that to obtain solutions with equivalent resolution, the AMR algorithm requires much less processing time, when compared with a uniform mesh algorithm.This article was processed using Springer-Verlag T_EX Shock Waves macro package 1.0 and the AMS fonts, developed by the American Mathematical Society.     

An adaptive mesh refinement approach for solving non-Hertzian elastic contact problems

Semi-analytical methods are a common way of solving non-hertzian contact problems when designing mechanical components. These methods require of the discretization of the domain into a set of pressure elements and their accuracy and computational cost are related to the number of elements in which the domain is discretized. But, while the accuracy increases as the pressure element mesh is refined, the computational cost increases quadratically with the number of pressure elements. So in the great majority of the cases, a commitment between accuracy and computational cost must be achieved. In this work, a new approach has been developed to improve the performance of semi-analytical methods for solving contact problems. This approach uses an adaptive mesh refinement strategy, based on the quadtree decomposition of the domain. As a result, the computational cost decreases, while the accuracy of the method remains constant.     

An adaptive cut‐cell method for environmental fluid mechanics

In this work we present a numerical method for solving the incompressible Navier–Stokes equations in an environmental fluid mechanics context. The method is designed for the study of environmental flows that are multiscale, incompressible, variable‐density, and within arbitrarily complex and possibly anisotropic domains. The method is new because in this context we couple the embedded‐boundary (or cut‐cell) method for complex geometry with block‐structured adaptive mesh refinement (AMR) while maintaining conservation and second‐order accuracy. The accurate simulation of variable‐density fluids necessitates special care in formulating projection methods. This variable‐density formulation is well known for incompressible flows in unit‐aspect ratio domains, without AMR, and without complex geometry, but here we carefully present a new method that addresses the intersection of these issues. The methodology is based on a second‐order‐accurate projection method with high‐order‐accurate Godunov finite‐differencing, including slope limiting and a stable differencing of the nonlinear convection terms. The finite‐volume AMR discretizations are based on two‐way flux matching at refinement boundaries to obtain a conservative method that is second‐order accurate in solution error. The control volumes are formed by the intersection of the irregular embedded boundary with Cartesian grid cells. Unlike typical discretization methods, these control volumes naturally fit within parallelizable, disjoint‐block data structures, and permit dynamic AMR coarsening and refinement as the simulation progresses. We present two‐ and three‐dimensional numerical examples to illustrate the accuracy of the method. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Feature‐based adaptive mesh refinement for wingtip vortices

Feature‐based solution‐adaptive mesh refinement is an attractive strategy when it is known a priori that the resolution of certain key features is critical to achieving the objectives of a simulation. In this paper, we apply vortex characterization techniques, which are typically employed to visualize vortices, to identify regions of the computational domain for mesh refinement. We investigate different refinement strategies that are facilitated by these vortex characterization techniques to simulate the flow past a wing in a wind tunnel. Our results, which we compare with experimental data, indicate that it is necessary to refine the region within and near the vortex extent surface to obtain an accurate prediction. Application of the identified mesh refinement strategy also produced observed improvement in the results predicted for a spinning missile with deflected canards. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A moving mesh BGK scheme for multi‐material flows

In this paper, a moving mesh BGK scheme (MMBGK) for multi‐material flow computations is proposed. The basic idea of constructing the MMBGK is to couple the Lagrangian method, which tracks material interfaces and keeps the interfaces sharp, with a remapping‐free ALE‐type kinetic method within each single material region, where the kinetic method is based on the BGK (Bhatnagar–Gross–Krook) model. Within each single material region, a numerical flux formulation is developed on moving meshes from motion of microscope particles, and the mesh velocity is determined by requiring both mesh adaptation for accuracy and robustness, such that the grids are moving towards to the regions with high flow gradients in a way of diffusive mechanism (velocity) to adjust the distances between neighboring cells, thus increasing the numerical accuracy. To keep the sharpness of material interfaces, the Lagrangian velocity and flux are constructed at the interfaces only. Consequently, a BGK‐scheme‐based ALE‐type method (i.e., the MMBGK scheme) for multi‐material flows is constructed. Numerical examples in one and two dimensions are presented to illustrate the accuracy and robustness of the MMBGK scheme. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Adaptive mesh refinement‐enhanced local DFD method and its application to solve Navier–Stokes equations

Recently, the domain‐free discretization (DFD) method was presented to efficiently solve problems with complex geometries without introducing the coordinate transformation. In order to exploit the high performance of the DFD method, in this paper, the local DFD method with the use of Cartesian mesh is presented, where the physical domain is covered by a Cartesian mesh and the local DFD method is applied for numerical discretization. In order to further improve the efficiency of the solver, the newly developed solution‐based adaptive mesh refinement (AMR) technique is also introduced. The proposed methods are then applied to the simulation of natural convection in concentric annuli between a square outer cylinder and a circular inner cylinder. Numerical experiments show that the present numerical results agree very well with available data in the literature, and AMR‐enhanced local DFD method is an effective tool for the computation of flow problems. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Third‐order Cartesian overset mesh adaptation method for solving steady compressible flows

A third‐order mesh generation and adaptation method is presented for solving the steady compressible Euler equations. For interior points, a third‐order scheme is used on Cartesian and curvilinear meshes. Concerning the mesh adaptation, the method of Meakin is also extended to third order. The accuracy of the new overset mesh adaptation method is demonstrated by a grid convergence study for 2‐D inviscid model problems and results are compared with a second‐order method. Finally, the method is applied to the computation of an inviscid 3‐D flow around a hovering blade of the ONERA 7A helicopter rotor exhibiting an improvement in the wake capture. With a 7 million point mesh, the tip vortex can be followed for more than three rotor revolutions with the third‐order method. The CPU time needed for this calculation is only 3% higher than with a conventional second‐order method. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Application of adaptive mesh refinement method to complex flows in clean rooms

The adaptive mesh refinement (AMR) method is developed for three-dimensional turbulent complex flows in clean rooms using the finite volume method with a collocated grid arrangement. Clean rooms have many interesting and complex flow characteristics especially the secondary flows and the recirculation regions. The accurate numerical solution of the flows is important for the efficient design of clean rooms. The use of the conventional uniform grid requires such a high computational time and data storage capacity that they make computational fluid dynamics (CFD) less attractive for the design optimization. The AMR method is, therefore, applied by using the fine grid only in the required regions and using the coarse grid in the other regions. The velocity is chosen as the main parameter for the grid refinement because it is the most influential parameter in clean rooms. The results show that the present AMR method can reduce the computational time by eight times and the data storage requirement is only 37% of that using the conventional method, while the same order of accuracy can be maintained. The present AMR method is, therefore, proved to be a promising technique for solving three-dimensional turbulent complex flows in clean rooms.     

Reordering and incomplete preconditioning in serial and parallel adaptive mesh refinement and coarsening flow solutions

The effects of reordering the unknowns on the convergence of incomplete factorization preconditioned Krylov subspace methods are investigated. Of particular interest is the resulting preconditioned iterative solver behavior when adaptive mesh refinement and coarsening (AMR/C) are utilized for serial or distributed parallel simulations. As representative schemes, we consider the familiar reverse Cuthill–McKee and quotient minimum degree algorithms applied with incomplete factorization preconditioners to CG and GMRES solvers. In the parallel distributed case, reordering is applied to local subdomains for block ILU preconditioning, and subdomains are repartitioned dynamically as mesh adaptation proceeds. Numerical studies for representative applications are conducted using the object‐oriented AMR/C software system libMesh linked to the PETSc solver library. Serial tests demonstrate that global unknown reordering and incomplete factorization preconditioning can reduce the number of iterations and improve serial CPU time in AMR/C computations. Parallel experiments indicate that local reordering for subdomain block preconditioning associated with dynamic repartitioning because of AMR/C leads to an overall reduction in processing time. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Adaptive mesh refinement for simulating fluid-structure interaction using a sharp interface immersed boundary method

In this article, adaptive mesh refinement (AMR) is performed to simulate flow around both stationary and moving boundaries. The finite-difference approach is applied along with a sharp interface immersed boundary (IB) method. The Lagrangian polynomial is employed to facilitate the interpolation from a coarse to a fine grid level, while a weighted-average formula is used to transfer variables inversely. To save memory, the finest grid is only generated in the local areas close to the wall boundary, and the mesh is dynamically reconstructed based on the location of the wall boundary. The Navier-Stokes equations are numerically solved through the second-order central difference scheme in space and the third-order Runge-Kutta time integration. Flow around a circular cylinder rotating in a square domain is firstly simulated to examine the accuracy and convergence rate. Then three cases are investigated to test the validity of the present method: flow past a stationary circular cylinder at low Reynolds numbers, flow past a forced oscillating circular cylinder in the transverse direction at various frequencies, and a free circular cylinder subjected to vortex-induced vibration in two degrees of freedom. Computational results agree well with these in the literature and the flow fields are smooth around the interface of different refinement levels. The effect of refinement level has also been evaluated. In addition, a study for the computational efficiency shows that the AMR approach is helpful to reduce the total node number and speed up the time integration, which could prompt the application of the IB method when a great near-wall spatial resolution is required.     

Adaptive mesh refinement techniques for high‐order shock capturing schemes for multi‐dimensional hydrodynamic simulations

The numerical simulation of physical phenomena represented by non‐linear hyperbolic systems of conservation laws presents specific difficulties mainly due to the presence of discontinuities in the solution. State of the art methods for the solution of such equations involve high resolution shock capturing schemes, which are able to produce sharp profiles at the discontinuities and high accuracy in smooth regions, together with some kind of grid adaption, which reduces the computational cost by using finer grids near the discontinuities and coarser grids in smooth regions. The combination of both techniques presents intrinsic numerical and programming difficulties. In this work we present a method obtained by the combination of a high‐order shock capturing scheme, built from Shu–Osher's conservative formulation (J. Comput. Phys. 1988; 77 :439–471; 1989; 83 :32–78), a fifth‐order weighted essentially non‐oscillatory (WENO) interpolatory technique (J. Comput. Phys. 1996; 126 :202–228) and Donat–Marquina's flux‐splitting method (J. Comput. Phys. 1996; 125 :42–58), with the adaptive mesh refinement (AMR) technique of Berger and collaborators (Adaptive mesh refinement for hyperbolic partial differential equations. Ph.D. Thesis, Computer Science Department, Stanford University, 1982; J. Comput. Phys. 1989; 82 :64–84; 1984; 53 :484–512). Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.