A boundary only procedure for time-dependent diffusion equations

In the recent literature, the boundary element method (BEM) is extensively used to solve time-dependent partial differential equations. However, most of these formulations yield algorithms where one has to include all interior points in the computation process if finite difference procedures are used to approximate the temporal derivative. This obviously restricts the advantages of the BEM, which is mainly considered to be a boundary only algorithm for time-independent problems. A new algorithm is demonstrated here, which extends the boundary only nature of the method to time-dependent partial differential equations. Using this procedure, one can reduce the finite difference time integration algorithm, generated in a standard manner, to a boundary only process. The proposed method is demonstrated with considerable success for diffusion problems. Results obtained in these applications are presented comparatively with analytical and other boundary element time integration procedures. The algorithm proposed may utilize several coordinate functions in the secondary reduction phase of the formulation. A summary of such functions is described here and performances of these functions are tested and compared in three applications. It is shown that some coordinate functions perform better than others under certain conditions. Using these results, we propose a general coordinate function, which may be used with satisfactory results in all parabolic partial differential equation applications.