A domain decomposition strategy to efficiently solve structures containing repeated patterns

This paper presents a strategy for the computation of structures with repeated patterns based on domain decomposition and block Krylov solvers. It can be seen as a special variant of the FETI method. We propose using the presence of repeated domains in the problem to compute the solution by minimizing the interface error on several directions simultaneously. The method not only drastically decreases the size of the problems to solve but also accelerates the convergence of interface problem for nearly no additional computational cost and minimizes expensive memory accesses. The numerical performances are illustrated on some thermal and elastic academic problems

Krylov subspaces associated with higher-order linear dynamical systems

A standard approach to model reduction of large-scale higher-order linear dynamical systems is to rewrite the system as an equivalent first-order system and then employ Krylov-subspace techniques for model reduction of first-order systems. This paper presents some results about the structure of the block-Krylov subspaces induced by the matrices of such equivalent first-order formulations of higher-order systems. Two general classes of matrices, which exhibit the key structures of the matrices of first-order formulations of higher-order systems, are introduced. It is proved that for both classes, the block-Krylov subspaces induced by the matrices in these classes can be viewed as multiple copies of certain subspaces of the state space of the original higher-order system

Total and selective reuse of Krylov subspaces for the resolution of sequences of nonlinear structural problems

This paper deals with the definition and optimization of augmentation spaces for faster convergence of the conjugate gradient method in the resolution of sequences of linear systems. Using advanced convergence results from the literature, we present a procedure based on a selection of relevant approximations of the eigenspaces for extracting, selecting and reusing information from the Krylov subspaces generated by previous solutions in order to accelerate the current iteration. Assessments of the method are proposed in the cases of both linear and nonlinear structural problems.Comment: International Journal for Numerical Methods in Engineering (2013) 24 page

Pade-Type Model Reduction of Second-Order and Higher-Order Linear Dynamical Systems

A standard approach to reduced-order modeling of higher-order linear dynamical systems is to rewrite the system as an equivalent first-order system and then employ Krylov-subspace techniques for reduced-order modeling of first-order systems. While this approach results in reduced-order models that are characterized as Pade-type or even true Pade approximants of the system's transfer function, in general, these models do not preserve the form of the original higher-order system. In this paper, we present a new approach to reduced-order modeling of higher-order systems based on projections onto suitably partitioned Krylov basis matrices that are obtained by applying Krylov-subspace techniques to an equivalent first-order system. We show that the resulting reduced-order models preserve the form of the original higher-order system. While the resulting reduced-order models are no longer optimal in the Pade sense, we show that they still satisfy a Pade-type approximation property. We also introduce the notion of Hermitian higher-order linear dynamical systems, and we establish an enhanced Pade-type approximation property in the Hermitian case

Updating the QR decomposition of block tridiagonal and block Hessenberg matrices

Abstract We present an efficient block-wise update scheme for the QR decomposition of block tridiagonal and block Hessenberg matrices. For example, such matrices come up in generalizations of the Krylov space solvers MinRes, SymmLQ, GMRes, and QMR to block methods for linear systems of equations with multiple right-hand sides. In the non-block case it is very efficient (and, in fact, standard) to use Givens rotations for these QR decompositions. Normally, the same approach is also used with column-wise updates in the block case. However, we show that, even for small block sizes, block-wise updates using (in general, complex) Householder reflections instead of Givens rotations are far more efficient in this case, in particular if the unitary transformations that incorporate the reflections determined by a whole block are computed explicitly. Naturally, the bigger the block size the bigger the savings. We discuss the somewhat complicated algorithmic details of this block-wise update, and present numerical experiments on accuracy and timing for the various options (Givens vs. Householder, block-wise vs. column-wise update, explicit vs. implicit computation of unitary transformations). Our treatment allows variable block sizes and can be adapted to block Hessenberg matrices that do not have the special structure encountered in the above mentioned block Krylov space solvers