Discontinuous Galerkin approximations in computational mechanics: hybridization, exact geometry and degree adaptivity

Discontinuous Galerkin (DG) discretizations with exact representation of the geometry and local polynomial degree adaptivity are revisited. Hybridization techniques are employed to reduce the computational cost of DG approximations and devise the hybridizable discontinuous Galerkin (HDG) method. Exact geometry described by non-uniform rational B-splines (NURBS) is integrated into HDG using the framework of the NURBS-enhanced finite element method (NEFEM). Moreover, optimal convergence and superconvergence properties of HDG-Voigt formulation in presence of symmetric second-order tensors are exploited to construct inexpensive error indicators and drive degree adaptive procedures. Applications involving the numerical simulation of problems in electrostatics, linear elasticity and incompressible viscous flows are presented. Moreover, this is done for both high-order HDG approximations and the lowest-order framework of face-centered finite volumes (FCFV).Peer ReviewedPostprint (author's final draft

A hybridizable discontinuous Galerkin method for electromagnetics with a view on subsurface applications

Two Hybridizable Discontinuous Galerkin (HDG) schemes for the solution of Maxwell's equations in the time domain are presented. The first method is based on an electromagnetic diffusion equation, while the second is based on Faraday's and Maxwell--Amp\`ere's laws. Both formulations include the diffusive term depending on the conductivity of the medium. The three-dimensional formulation of the electromagnetic diffusion equation in the framework of HDG methods, the introduction of the conduction current term and the choice of the electric field as hybrid variable in a mixed formulation are the key points of the current study. Numerical results are provided for validation purposes and convergence studies of spatial and temporal discretizations are carried out. The test cases include both simulation in dielectric and conductive media

A nested hybridizable discontinuous Galerkin method for computing second-harmonic generation in three-dimensional metallic nanostructures

In this paper, we develop a nested hybridizable discontinuous Galerkin (HDG) method to numerically solve the Maxwell's equations coupled with the hydrodynamic model for the conduction-band electrons in metals. By means of a static condensation to eliminate the degrees of freedom of the approximate solution defined in the elements, the HDG method yields a linear system in terms of the degrees of freedom of the approximate trace defined on the element boundaries. Furthermore, we propose to reorder these degrees of freedom so that the linear system accommodates a second static condensation to eliminate a large portion of the degrees of freedom of the approximate trace, thereby yielding a much smaller linear system. For the particular metallic structures considered in this paper, the resulting linear system obtained by means of nested static condensations is a block tridiagonal system, which can be solved efficiently. We apply the nested HDG method to compute the second harmonic generation (SHG) on a triangular coaxial periodic nanogap structure. This nonlinear optics phenomenon features rapid field variations and extreme boundary-layer structures that span multiple length scales. Numerical results show that the ability to identify structures which exhibit resonances at $\omega$ and $2\omega$ is paramount to excite the second harmonic response.Comment: 31 pages, 7 figure

Computing parametrized solutions for plasmonic nanogap structures

The interaction of electromagnetic waves with metallic nanostructures generates resonant oscillations of the conduction-band electrons at the metal surface. These resonances can lead to large enhancements of the incident field and to the confinement of light to small regions, typically several orders of magnitude smaller than the incident wavelength. The accurate prediction of these resonances entails several challenges. Small geometric variations in the plasmonic structure may lead to large variations in the electromagnetic field responses. Furthermore, the material parameters that characterize the optical behavior of metals at the nanoscale need to be determined experimentally and are consequently subject to measurement errors. It then becomes essential that any predictive tool for the simulation and design of plasmonic structures accounts for fabrication tolerances and measurement uncertainties. In this paper, we develop a reduced order modeling framework that is capable of real-time accurate electromagnetic responses of plasmonic nanogap structures for a wide range of geometry and material parameters. The main ingredients of the proposed method are: (i) the hybridizable discontinuous Galerkin method to numerically solve the equations governing electromagnetic wave propagation in dielectric and metallic media, (ii) a reference domain formulation of the time-harmonic Maxwell's equations to account for geometry variations; and (iii) proper orthogonal decomposition and empirical interpolation techniques to construct an efficient reduced model. To demonstrate effectiveness of the models developed, we analyze geometry sensitivities and explore optimal designs of a 3D periodic annular nanogap structure.Comment: 28 pages, 9 figures, 4 tables, 2 appendice

A Coupled Hybridizable Discontinuous Galerkin and Boundary Integral Method for Analyzing Electromagnetic Scattering

A coupled hybridizable discontinuous Galerkin (HDG) and boundary integral (BI) method is proposed to efficiently analyze electromagnetic scattering from inhomogeneous/composite objects. The coupling between the HDG and the BI equations is realized using the numerical flux operating on the equivalent current and the global unknown of the HDG. This approach yields sparse coupling matrices upon discretization. Inclusion of the BI equation ensures that the only error in enforcing the radiation conditions is the discretization. However, the discretization of this equation yields a dense matrix, which prohibits the use of a direct matrix solver on the overall coupled system as often done with traditional HDG schemes. To overcome this bottleneck, a "hybrid" method is developed. This method uses an iterative scheme to solve the overall coupled system but within the matrix-vector multiplication subroutine of the iterations, the inverse of the HDG matrix is efficiently accounted for using a sparse direct matrix solver. The same subroutine also uses the multilevel fast multipole algorithm to accelerate the multiplication of the guess vector with the dense BI matrix. The numerical results demonstrate the accuracy, the efficiency, and the applicability of the proposed HDG-BI solver

An explicit hybridizable discontinuous Galerkin method for the 3D time-domain Maxwell equations

International audienceWe present an explicit hybridizable discontinuous Galerkin (HDG) method for numerically solving the system of three-dimensional (3D) time-domain Maxwell equations. The method is fully explicit similarly to classical so-called DGTD (Dis-continuous Galerkin Time-Domain) methods, is also high-order accurate in both space and time and can be seen as a generalization of the classical DGTD scheme based on upwind fluxes. We provide numerical results aiming at assessing its numerical convergence properties by considering a model problem and we present preliminary results of the superconvergence property on the H curl norm

Non-modal analysis of spectral element methods: Towards accurate and robust large-eddy simulations

We introduce a \textit{non-modal} analysis technique that characterizes the diffusion properties of spectral element methods for linear convection-diffusion systems. While strictly speaking only valid for linear problems, the analysis is devised so that it can give critical insights on two questions: (i) Why do spectral element methods suffer from stability issues in under-resolved computations of nonlinear problems? And, (ii) why do they successfully predict under-resolved turbulent flows even without a subgrid-scale model? The answer to these two questions can in turn provide crucial guidelines to construct more robust and accurate schemes for complex under-resolved flows, commonly found in industrial applications. For illustration purposes, this analysis technique is applied to the hybridized discontinuous Galerkin methods as representatives of spectral element methods. The effect of the polynomial order, the upwinding parameter and the P\'eclet number on the so-called \textit{short-term diffusion} of the scheme are investigated. From a purely non-modal analysis point of view, polynomial orders between $2$ and $4$ with standard upwinding are well suited for under-resolved turbulence simulations. For lower polynomial orders, diffusion is introduced in scales that are much larger than the grid resolution. For higher polynomial orders, as well as for strong under/over-upwinding, robustness issues can be expected. The non-modal analysis results are then tested against under-resolved turbulence simulations of the Burgers, Euler and Navier-Stokes equations. While devised in the linear setting, our non-modal analysis succeeds to predict the behavior of the scheme in the nonlinear problems considered

HDGlab: An Open-Source Implementation of the Hybridisable Discontinuous Galerkin Method in MATLAB

This paper presents HDGlab, an open source MATLAB implementation of the hybridisable discontinuous Galerkin (HDG) method. The main goal is to provide a detailed description of both the HDG method for elliptic problems and its implementation available in HDGlab. Ultimately, this is expected to make this relatively new advanced discretisation method more accessible to the computational engineering community. HDGlab presents some features not available in other implementations of the HDG method that can be found in the free domain. First, it implements high-order polynomial shape functions up to degree nine, with both equally-spaced and Fekete nodal distributions. Second, it supports curved isoparametric simplicial elements in two and three dimensions. Third, it supports non-uniform degree polynomial approximations and it provides a flexible structure to devise degree adaptivity strategies. Finally, an interface with the open-source high-order mesh generator Gmsh is provided to facilitate its application to practical engineering problems