A finite element formulation satisfying the discrete geometric conservation law based on averaged Jacobians

In this article, a new methodology for developing discrete geometric conservation law (DGCL) compliant formulations is presented. It is carried out in the context of the finite element method for general advective–diffusive systems on moving domains using an ALE scheme. There is an extensive literature about the impact of DGCL compliance on the stability and precision of time integration methods. In those articles, it has been proved that satisfying the DGCL is a necessary and sufficient condition for any ALE scheme to maintain on moving grids the nonlinear stability properties of its fixed‐grid counterpart. However, only a few works proposed a methodology for obtaining a compliant scheme. In this work, a DGCL compliant scheme based on an averaged ALE Jacobians formulation is obtained. This new formulation is applied to the θ family of time integration methods. In addition, an extension to the three‐point backward difference formula is given. With the aim to validate the averaged ALE Jacobians formulation, a set of numerical tests are performed. These tests include 2D and 3D diffusion problems with different mesh movements and the 2D compressible Navier–Stokes equations. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A stable and accurate projection method on a locally refined staggered mesh

In this paper, a robust projection method on a locally refined mesh is proposed for two‐ and three‐dimensional viscous incompressible flows. The proposed method is robust not only when the interface between two meshes is located in a smooth flow region but also when the interface is located in a flow region with large gradients and/or strong unsteadiness. In numerical simulations, a locally refined mesh saves many grid points in regions of relatively small gradients compared with a uniform mesh. For efficiency and ease of implementation, we consider a two‐level blocked structure, for which both of the coarse and fine meshes are uniform Cartesian ones individually. Unfortunately, the introduction of the two‐level blocked mesh results in an important but difficult issue: coupling of the coarse and fine meshes. In this paper, by properly addressing the issue of the coupling, we propose a stable and accurate projection method on a locally refined staggered mesh for both two‐ and three‐dimensional viscous incompressible flows. The proposed projection method is based on two principles: the linear interpolation technique and the consistent discretization of both sides of the pressure Poisson equation. The proposed algorithm is straightforward owing to the linear interpolation technique, is stable and accurate, is easy to extend from two‐ to three‐dimensional flows, and is valid even when flows with large gradients cross the interface between the two meshes. The resulting pressure Poisson equation is non‐symmetric on a locally refined mesh. The numerical results for a series of exact solutions for 2D and 3D viscous incompressible flows verify the stability and accuracy of the proposed projection method. The method is also applied to some challenging problems, including turbulent flows around particles, flows induced by impulsively started/stopped particles, and flows induced by particles near solid walls, to test the stability and accuracy. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Coupled Models and Parallel Simulations for Three-Dimensional Full-Stokes Ice Sheet Modeling

A three-dimensional full-Stokes computational model is considered for determining the dynamics,temperature,and thickness of ice sheets.The goveming thermomechanical equations consist of the three-dimensional full-Stokes system with nonlinear rheology for the momentum,an advective-diffusion energy equation for temperature evolution,and a mass conservation equation for ice-thickness changes.Here,we discuss the variable resolution meshes,the finite element discretizations,and the parallel algorithms employed by the model components.The solvers are integrated through a well-designed coupler for the exchange of parametric data between components.The discretization utilizes high-quality,variable-resolution centroidal Voronoi Delaunay triangulation meshing and existing parallel solvers.We demonstrate the gridding technology,discretization schemes,and the efficiency and scalability of the parallel solvers through computational experiments using both simplified geometries arising from benchmark test problems and a realistic Greenland ice sheet geometry.     

Convergence on layer-adapted meshes and anisotropic interpolation error estimates of non-standard higher order finite elements

For a general class of finite element spaces based on local polynomial spaces E with Pp⊂E⊂Qp we construct a vertex-edge-cell and point-value oriented interpolation operators that fulfil anisotropic interpolation error estimates.Using these estimates we prove ε-uniform convergence of order p for the Galerkin FEM and the LPSFEM for a singularly perturbed convection-diffusion problem with characteristic boundary layers.     

Hybrid mesh adaptation applied to industrial numerical combustion

This paper presents an anisotropic mesh adaptation method applied to industrial combustion problems. The method is based on a measure of the distance between two Riemannian metrics called metric non‐conformity. This measure, which can be used to build a cost function to adapt meshes comprising several types of mesh elements, provides the basis for a generic mesh adaptation approach applicable to various types of physical problems governed by partial differential equations. The approach is shown to be applicable to industrial combustion problems, through the specification of a target metric computed as the intersection of several Hessian matrices reconstructed from the main variables of the governing equations. Numerical results show that the approach is cost effective in that it can drastically improve the prediction of temperature and species distributions in the flame region of a combustor while reducing computational cost. The results can be used as a basis for pollutant prediction models. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

On the adjacencies of triangular meshes based on skeleton-regular partitions

For any 2D triangulation τ, the 1-skeleton mesh of τ is the wireframe mesh defined by the edges of τ, while that for any 3D triangulation τ, the 1-skeleton and the 2-skeleton meshes, respectively, correspond to the wireframe mesh formed by the edges of τ and the “surface” mesh defined by the triangular faces of τ. A skeleton-regular partition of a triangle or a tetrahedra, is a partition that globally applied over each element of a conforming mesh (where the intersection of adjacent elements is a vertex or a common face, or a common edge) produce both a refined conforming mesh and refined and conforming skeleton meshes. Such a partition divides all the edges (and all the faces) of an individual element in the same number of edges (faces). We prove that sequences of meshes constructed by applying a skeleton-regular partition over each element of the preceding mesh have an associated set of difference equations which relate the number of elements, faces, edges and vertices of the nth and (n−1)th meshes. By using these constitutive difference equations we prove that asymptotically the average number of adjacencies over these meshes (number of triangles by node and number of tetrahedra by vertex) is constant when n goes to infinity. We relate these results with the non-degeneracy properties of longest-edge based partitions in 2D and include empirical results which support the conjecture that analogous results hold in 3D.     

Domain decomposition preconditioners of Neumann-Neumann type for hp-approximations on boundary layer meshes in three dimensions

We develop and analyse Neumann–Neumann methods for hpfinite-element approximations of scalar elliptic problems ongeometrically refined boundary layer meshes in three dimensions.These are meshes that are highly anisotropic where the aspectratio typically grows exponentially with the polynomial degree.The condition number of our preconditioners is shown to be independentof the aspect ratio of the mesh and of potentially large jumpsof the coefficients. In addition, it only grows polylogarithmicallywith the polynomial degree, as in the case of p approximationson shape-regular meshes. This work generalizes our previousone on two-dimensional problems in Toselli & Vasseur (2003a,submitted to Numerische Mathematik, 2003c to appear in Comput.Methods Appl. Mech. Engng.) and the estimates derived here canbe employed to prove condition number bounds for certain typesof FETI methods.     

Locking-free DGFEM for elasticity problems in polygons

The h-version of the discontinuous Galerkin finite element method(h-DGFEM) for nearly incompressible linear elasticity problemsin polygons is analysed. It is proved that the scheme is robust(locking-free) with respect to volume locking, even in the absenceof H²-regularity of the solution. Furthermore, it is shown thatan appropriate choice of the finite element meshes leads torobust and optimal algebraic convergence rates of the DGFEMeven if the exact solutions do not belong to H².     

Superconvergence of a Nonconforming Finite Element Approximation to Viscoelasticity Type Equations on Anisotropic Meshes

The main aim of this paper is to study the approximation to viscoelasticity type equations with a Crouzeix-Raviart type nonconforming finite element on the anisotropic meshes. The superclose property of the exact solution and the optimal error estimate of its derivative with respect to time are derived by using some novel techniques. Moreover, employing a postprocessing technique, the global superconvergence property for the discretization error of the postprocessed discrete solution to the solution itself is studied.     

Adaptive unstructured finite element method for two-dimensional detonation simulations

A non-equilibrium reacting flow methodology has been added to a conservative, monotonic, compressible flow solver to allow numerical simulations of gas detonations. This flow solver incorporates unstructured dynamically adaptive meshes with the Finite Element Method – Flux Corrected Transport (FEM-FCT) scheme, which has shown excellent predictive capability of various non-reacting compressible flows. A two-step induction parameter model was used to model the combustion of the gas phase coupled with an energy release equation which was simulated with a point implicit finite element scheme. This combustion model was then applied to a two-dimensional detonation test case of a hypothetical fuel:oxygen mixture. The detonation simulation yielded two transverse waves which continued to propagate. This feature and the detonation shock speed mean and fluctuations were found to be grid-independent based on a resolution of about twenty elements within the average induction length. The resolution was efficiently achieved with the unstructured dynamically adaptive finite elements, which were three orders of magnitude less in number then required for uniform discretization. Received 26 August 1996 / Accepted 31 March 1997