Numerical properties of high order discrete velocity solutions to the BGK kinetic equation

A high order numerical method for the solution of model kinetic equations is proposed. The new method employs discontinuous Galerkin (DG) discretizations in the spatial and velocity variables and Runge-Kutta discretizations in the temporal variable. The method is implemented for the one-dimensional Bhatnagar-Gross-Krook equation. Convergence of the numerical solution and accuracy of the evaluation of macroparameters are studied for different orders of velocity discretization. Synthetic model problems are proposed and implemented to test accuracy of discretizations in the free molecular regime. The method is applied to the solution of the normal shock wave problem and the one-dimensional heat transfer problem.