A Hybrid Godunov Method for Radiation Hydrodynamics

From a mathematical perspective, radiation hydrodynamics can be thought of as a system of hyperbolic balance laws with dual multiscale behavior (multiscale behavior associated with the hyperbolic wave speeds as well as multiscale behavior associated with source term relaxation). With this outlook in mind, this paper presents a hybrid Godunov method for one-dimensional radiation hydrodynamics that is uniformly well behaved from the photon free streaming (hyperbolic) limit through the weak equilibrium diffusion (parabolic) limit and to the strong equilibrium diffusion (hyperbolic) limit. Moreover, one finds that the technique preserves certain asymptotic limits. The method incorporates a backward Euler upwinding scheme for the radiation energy density and flux as well as a modified Godunov scheme for the material density, momentum density, and energy density. The backward Euler upwinding scheme is first-order accurate and uses an implicit HLLE flux function to temporally advance the radiation components according to the material flow scale. The modified Godunov scheme is second-order accurate and directly couples stiff source term effects to the hyperbolic structure of the system of balance laws. This Godunov technique is composed of a predictor step that is based on Duhamel's principle and a corrector step that is based on Picard iteration. The Godunov scheme is explicit on the material flow scale but is unsplit and fully couples matter and radiation without invoking a diffusion-type approximation for radiation hydrodynamics. This technique derives from earlier work by Miniati & Colella 2007. Numerical tests demonstrate that the method is stable, robust, and accurate across various parameter regimes.Comment: accepted for publication in Journal of Computational Physics; 61 pages, 15 figures, 11 table

Well-balanced and asymptotic preserving schemes for kinetic models

In this paper, we propose a general framework for designing numerical schemes that have both well-balanced (WB) and asymptotic preserving (AP) properties, for various kinds of kinetic models. We are interested in two different parameter regimes, 1) When the ratio between the mean free path and the characteristic macroscopic length $\epsilon$ tends to zero, the density can be described by (advection) diffusion type (linear or nonlinear) macroscopic models; 2) When $\epsilon$ = O(1), the models behave like hyperbolic equations with source terms and we are interested in their steady states. We apply the framework to three different kinetic models: neutron transport equation and its diffusion limit, the transport equation for chemotaxis and its Keller-Segel limit, and grey radiative transfer equation and its nonlinear diffusion limit. Numerical examples are given to demonstrate the properties of the schemes

An Asymptotic Preserving Scheme for the ES-BGK model

In this paper, we study a time discrete scheme for the initial value problem of the ES-BGK kinetic equation. Numerically solving these equations are challenging due to the nonlinear stiff collision (source) terms induced by small mean free or relaxation time. We study an implicit-explicit (IMEX) time discretization in which the convection is explicit while the relaxation term is implicit to overcome the stiffness. We first show how the implicit relaxation can be solved explicitly, and then prove asymptotically that this time discretization drives the density distribution toward the local Maxwellian when the mean free time goes to zero while the numerical time step is held fixed. This naturally imposes an asymptotic-preserving scheme in the Euler limit. The scheme so designed does not need any nonlinear iterative solver for the implicit relaxation term. Moreover, it can capture the macroscopic fluid dynamic (Euler) limit even if the small scale determined by the Knudsen number is not numerically resolved. We also show that it is consistent to the compressible Navier-Stokes equations if the viscosity and heat conductivity are numerically resolved. Several numerical examples, in both one and two space dimensions, are used to demonstrate the desired behavior of this scheme

Asymptotic-Preserving Monte Carlo methods for transport equations in the diffusive limit

We develop a new Monte Carlo method that solves hyperbolic transport equations with stiff terms, characterized by a (small) scaling parameter. In particular, we focus on systems which lead to a reduced problem of parabolic type in the limit when the scaling parameter tends to zero. Classical Monte Carlo methods suffer of severe time step limitations in these situations, due to the fact that the characteristic speeds go to infinity in the diffusion limit. This makes the problem a real challenge, since the scaling parameter may differ by several orders of magnitude in the domain. To circumvent these time step limitations, we construct a new, asymptotic-preserving Monte Carlo method that is stable independently of the scaling parameter and degenerates to a standard probabilistic approach for solving the limiting equation in the diffusion limit. The method uses an implicit time discretization to formulate a modified equation in which the characteristic speeds do not grow indefinitely when the scaling factor tends to zero. The resulting modified equation can readily be discretized by a Monte Carlo scheme, in which the particles combine a finite propagation speed with a time-step dependent diffusion term. We show the performance of the method by comparing it with standard (deterministic) approaches in the literature

A Unified Gas-kinetic Scheme for Continuum and Rarefied Flows IV: full Boltzmann and Model Equations

Fluid dynamic equations are valid in their respective modeling scales. With a variation of the modeling scales, theoretically there should have a continuous spectrum of fluid dynamic equations. In order to study multiscale flow evolution efficiently, the dynamics in the computational fluid has to be changed with the scales. A direct modeling of flow physics with a changeable scale may become an appropriate approach. The unified gas-kinetic scheme (UGKS) is a direct modeling method in the mesh size scale, and its underlying flow physics depends on the resolution of the cell size relative to the particle mean free path. The cell size of UGKS is not limited by the particle mean free path. With the variation of the ratio between the numerical cell size and local particle mean free path, the UGKS recovers the flow dynamics from the particle transport and collision in the kinetic scale to the wave propagation in the hydrodynamic scale. The previous UGKS is mostly constructed from the evolution solution of kinetic model equations. This work is about the further development of the UGKS with the implementation of the full Boltzmann collision term in the region where it is needed. The central ingredient of the UGKS is the coupled treatment of particle transport and collision in the flux evaluation across a cell interface, where a continuous flow dynamics from kinetic to hydrodynamic scales is modeled. The newly developed UGKS has the asymptotic preserving (AP) property of recovering the NS solutions in the continuum flow regime, and the full Boltzmann solution in the rarefied regime. In the mostly unexplored transition regime, the UGKS itself provides a valuable tool for the flow study in this regime. The mathematical properties of the scheme, such as stability, accuracy, and the asymptotic preserving, will be analyzed in this paper as well

The Moment Guided Monte Carlo method for the Boltzmann equation

In this work we propose a generalization of the Moment Guided Monte Carlo method developed in [11]. This approach permits to reduce the variance of the particle methods through a matching with a set of suitable macroscopic moment equations. In order to guarantee that the moment equations provide the correct solutions, they are coupled to the kinetic equation through a non equilibrium term. Here, at the contrary to the previous work in which we considered the simplified BGK operator, we deal with the full Boltzmann operator. Moreover, we introduce an hybrid setting which permits to entirely remove the resolution of the kinetic equation in the limit of infinite number of collisions and to consider only the solution of the compressible Euler equation. This modification additionally reduce the statistical error with respect to our previous work and permits to perform simulations of non equilibrium gases using only a few number of particles. We show at the end of the paper several numerical tests which prove the efficiency and the low level of numerical noise of the method.Comment: arXiv admin note: text overlap with arXiv:0908.026

Implicit-Explicit Runge-Kutta schemes for hyperbolic systems and kinetic equations in the diffusion limit

We consider Implicit-Explicit (IMEX) Runge-Kutta (R-K) schemes for hyperbolic systems with stiff relaxation in the so-called diffusion limit. In such regime the system relaxes towards a convection-diffusion equation. The first objective of the paper is to show that traditional partitioned IMEX R-K schemes will relax to an explicit scheme for the limit equation with no need of modification of the original system. Of course the explicit scheme obtained in the limit suffers from the classical parabolic stability restriction on the time step. The main goal of the paper is to present an approach, based on IMEX R-K schemes, that in the diffusion limit relaxes to an IMEX R-K scheme for the convection-diffusion equation, in which the diffusion is treated implicitly. This is achieved by an original reformulation of the problem, and subsequent application of IMEX R-K schemes to it. An analysis on such schemes to the reformulated problem shows that the schemes reduce to IMEX R-K schemes for the limit equation, under the same conditions derived for hyperbolic relaxation. Several numerical examples including neutron transport equations confirm the theoretical analysis

A Comparative Study of an Asymptotic Preserving Scheme and Unified Gas-kinetic Scheme in Continuum Flow Limit

Asymptotic preserving (AP) schemes are targeting to simulate both continuum and rarefied flows. Many AP schemes have been developed and are capable of capturing the Euler limit in the continuum regime. However, to get accurate Navier-Stokes solutions is still challenging for many AP schemes. In order to distinguish the numerical effects of different AP schemes on the simulation results in the continuum flow limit, an implicit-explicit (IMEX) AP scheme and the unified gas kinetic scheme (UGKS) based on Bhatnagar-Gross-Krook (BGk) kinetic equation will be applied in the flow simulation in both transition and continuum flow regimes. As a benchmark test case, the lid-driven cavity flow is used for the comparison of these two AP schemes. The numerical results show that the UGKS captures the viscous solution accurately. The velocity profiles are very close to the classical benchmark solutions. However, the IMEX AP scheme seems have difficulty to get these solutions. Based on the analysis and the numerical experiments, it is realized that the dissipation of AP schemes in continuum limit is closely related to the numerical treatment of collision and transport of the kinetic equation. Numerically it becomes necessary to couple the convection and collision terms in both flux evaluation at a cell interface and the collision source term treatment inside each control volume