An alternating direction implicit spectral method for solving two dimensional multi-term time fractional mixed diffusion and diffusion-wave equations

In this paper, we consider the initial boundary value problem of the two dimensional multi-term time fractional mixed diffusion and diffusion-wave equations. An alternating direction implicit (ADI) spectral method is developed based on Legendre spectral approximation in space and finite difference discretization in time. Numerical stability and convergence of the schemes are proved, the optimal error is $O(N^{-r}+\tau^2)$, where $N, \tau, r$ are the polynomial degree, time step size and the regularity of the exact solution, respectively. We also consider the non-smooth solution case by adding some correction terms. Numerical experiments are presented to confirm our theoretical analysis. These techniques can be used to model diffusion and transport of viscoelastic non-Newtonian fluids

Novel numerical analysis of multi-term time fractional viscoelastic non-Newtonian fluid models for simulating unsteady MHD Couette flow of a generalized Oldroyd-B fluid

In recent years, non-Newtonian fluids have received much attention due to their numerous applications, such as plastic manufacture and extrusion of polymer fluids. They are more complex than Newtonian fluids because the relationship between shear stress and shear rate is nonlinear. One particular subclass of non-Newtonian fluids is the generalized Oldroyd-B fluid, which is modelled using terms involving multi-term time fractional diffusion and reaction. In this paper, we consider the application of the finite difference method for this class of novel multi-term time fractional viscoelastic non-Newtonian fluid models. An important contribution of the work is that the new model not only has a multi-term time derivative, of which the fractional order indices range from 0 to 2, but also possesses a special time fractional operator on the spatial derivative that is challenging to approximate. There appears to be no literature reported on the numerical solution of this type of equation. We derive two new different finite difference schemes to approximate the model. Then we establish the stability and convergence analysis of these schemes based on the discrete $H^1$ norm and prove that their accuracy is of $O(\tau+h^2)$ and $O(\tau^{\min\{3-\gamma_s,2-\alpha_q,2-\beta\}}+h^2)$, respectively. Finally, we verify our methods using two numerical examples and apply the schemes to simulate an unsteady magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) Couette flow of a generalized Oldroyd-B fluid model. Our methods are effective and can be extended to solve other non-Newtonian fluid models such as the generalized Maxwell fluid model, the generalized second grade fluid model and the generalized Burgers fluid model.Comment: 19 pages, 8 figures, 3 table

Numerical Simulation for Solute Transport in Fractal Porous Media

A modified Fokker-Planck equation with continuous source for solute transport in fractal porous media is considered. The dispersion term of the governing equation uses a fractional-order derivative and the diffusion coefficient can be time and scale dependent. In this paper, numerical solution of the modified Fokker-Planck equation is proposed. The effects of different fractional orders and fractional power functions of time and distance are numerically investigated. The results show that motions with a heavy tailed marginal distribution can be modelled by equations that use fractional-order derivatives and/or time and scale dependent dispersivity

Computationally efficient methods for solving time-variable-order time-space fractional reaction-diffusion equation

Fractional differential equations are becoming more widely accepted as a powerful tool in modelling anomalous diffusion, which is exhibited by various materials and processes. Recently, researchers have suggested that rather than using constant order fractional operators, some processes are more accurately modelled using fractional orders that vary with time and/or space. In this paper we develop computationally efficient techniques for solving time-variable-order time-space fractional reaction-diffusion equations (tsfrde) using the finite difference scheme. We adopt the Coimbra variable order time fractional operator and variable order fractional Laplacian operator in space where both orders are functions of time. Because the fractional operator is nonlocal, it is challenging to efficiently deal with its long range dependence when using classical numerical techniques to solve such equations. The novelty of our method is that the numerical solution of the time-variable-order tsfrde is written in terms of a matrix function vector product at each time step. This product is approximated efficiently by the Lanczos method, which is a powerful iterative technique for approximating the action of a matrix function by projecting onto a Krylov subspace. Furthermore an adaptive preconditioner is constructed that dramatically reduces the size of the required Krylov subspaces and hence the overall computational cost. Numerical examples, including the variable-order fractional Fisher equation, are presented to demonstrate the accuracy and efficiency of the approach

An unstructured mesh control volume method for two-dimensional space fractional diffusion equations with variable coefficients on convex domains

In this paper, we propose a novel unstructured mesh control volume method to deal with the space fractional derivative on arbitrarily shaped convex domains, which to the best of our knowledge is a new contribution to the literature. Firstly, we present the finite volume scheme for the two-dimensional space fractional diffusion equation with variable coefficients and provide the full implementation details for the case where the background interpolation mesh is based on triangular elements. Secondly, we explore the property of the stiffness matrix generated by the integral of space fractional derivative. We find that the stiffness matrix is sparse and not regular. Therefore, we choose a suitable sparse storage format for the stiffness matrix and develop a fast iterative method to solve the linear system, which is more efficient than using the Gaussian elimination method. Finally, we present several examples to verify our method, in which we make a comparison of our method with the finite element method for solving a Riesz space fractional diffusion equation on a circular domain. The numerical results demonstrate that our method can reduce CPU time significantly while retaining the same accuracy and approximation property as the finite element method. The numerical results also illustrate that our method is effective and reliable and can be applied to problems on arbitrarily shaped convex domains.Comment: 18 pages, 5 figures, 9 table

Anomalous diffusion in rotating Casson fluid through a porous medium

This paper investigates the space-fractional anomalous diffusion in unsteady Casson fluid through a porous medium, based on an uncoupled continuous time random walk. The influences of binary chemical reaction and activation energy between two horizontal rotating parallel plates are taken into account. The governing equations of motion are reduced to a set of nonlinear differential equations by time derivatives discretization and generalized transformation, which are solved by bvp4c and implicit finite difference method (IFDM). Stability and convergence of IFDM are proved and some numerical comparisons to the previous study are presented with excellent agreement. The effects of involved physical parameters such as fractional derivative parameter, rotation parameter and time parameter are presented and analyzed through graphs. Results indicate that the increase of fractional derivative parameter triggers concentration increase near the lower plate, while it causes a reduction near the upper plate. It is worth mentioning that the decrease of heat transfer rate on the plate is observed with the higher time parameter.</p

Numerical Investigation of a Two-Phase Nanofluid Model for Boundary Layer Flow Past a Variable Thickness Sheet

Abstract This paper investigates heat and mass transfer of nanofluid over a stretching sheet with variable thickness. The techniques of similarity transformation and homotopy analysis method are used to find solutions. Velocity, temperature, and concentration fields are examined with the variations of governing parameters. Local Nusselt number and Sherwood number are compared for different values of variable thickness parameter. The results show that there exists a critical value of thickness parameter β c (β c ≈0.7) where the Sherwood number achieves its maximum at the critical value β c . For β&gt;β c , the distribution of nanoparticle volume fraction decreases near the surface but exhibits an opposite trend far from the surface.</jats:p

Effects of fractional mass transfer and chemical reaction on MHD flow in a heterogeneous porous medium

This paper presents a study on space fractional anomalous convective-diffusion and chemical reaction in the magneto-hydrodynamic fluid over an unsteady stretching sheet. The fractional diffusion model is derived from decoupled continuous time random walks in a heterogeneous porous medium. A novel transformation which features time finite difference is introduced to reduce the governing equations into ordinary differential ones in each time level. Numerical solutions are established by an implicit finite difference scheme. The stability and convergence of the method are analyzed. Results show that increasing fractional derivative parameter enhances concentration near the surface while an opposite phenomenon occurs far away from the wall. There is a reduction of mass transfer rate on the sheet with an increase in the fractional derivative parameter. Moreover, the numerical solutions are compared with exact solutions and good agreement has been observed.</p

First description of the female of Cyrtodactylus dianxiensis Liu &amp;amp; Rao, 2021, with extended diagnosis of this species (Squamata, Gekkonidae)

Cyrtodactylus dianxiensis Liu &amp;amp; Rao, 2021 was originally described based on only two adult male specimens from Tongbiguan Nature Reserve, Dehong Autonomous Prefecture, western Yunnan, China. So far, no information on the females of this species is available. During comprehensive herpetofaunal investigations in 2022, one female specimen of C. dianxiensis was collected from Tongbiguan Nature Reserve. The female specimen agrees well with the original description of C. dianxiensis, and also shows some slight differences in coloration. This study reported the female specimen of this species for the first time, and provided a description and photos of the female specimen; meanwhile, we extended the diagnosis of this species