A Galerkin boundary element method for high frequency scattering by convex polygons

In this paper we consider the problem of time-harmonic acoustic scattering in two dimensions by convex polygons. Standard boundary or finite element methods for acoustic scattering problems have a computational cost that grows at least linearly as a function of the frequency of the incident wave. Here we present a novel Galerkin boundary element method, which uses an approximation space consisting of the products of plane waves with piecewise polynomials supported on a graded mesh, with smaller elements closer to the corners of the polygon. We prove that the best approximation from the approximation space requires a number of degrees of freedom to achieve a prescribed level of accuracy that grows only logarithmically as a function of the frequency. Numerical results demonstrate the same logarithmic dependence on the frequency for the Galerkin method solution. Our boundary element method is a discretization of a well-known second kind combined-layer-potential integral equation. We provide a proof that this equation and its adjoint are well-posed and equivalent to the boundary value problem in a Sobolev space setting for general Lipschitz domains

Fast computation of effective diffusivities using a semi-analytical solution of the homogenization boundary value problem for block locally-isotropic heterogeneous media

Direct numerical simulation of diffusion through heterogeneous media can be difficult due to the computational cost of resolving fine-scale heterogeneities. One method to overcome this difficulty is to homogenize the model by replacing the spatially-varying fine-scale diffusivity with an effective diffusivity calculated from the solution of an appropriate boundary value problem. In this paper, we present a new semi-analytical method for solving this boundary value problem and computing the effective diffusivity for pixellated, locally-isotropic, heterogeneous media. We compare our new solution method to a standard finite volume method and show that equivalent accuracy can be achieved in less computational time for several standard test cases. We also demonstrate how the new solution method can be applied to complex heterogeneous geometries represented by a grid of blocks. These results indicate that our new semi-analytical method has the potential to significantly speed up simulations of diffusion in heterogeneous media.Comment: 29 pages, 4 figures, 5 table

Analytical and numerical techniques for wave scattering

In this thesis, we study the mathematical solution of wave scattering problems which describe the behaviour of waves incident on obstacles and are highly relevant to a raft of applications in the aerospace industry. The techniques considered in the present work can be broadly classed into two categories: analytically based methods which use special transforms and functions to provide a near-complete mathematical description of the scattering process, and numerical techniques which select an approximate solution from a general finite-dimensional space of possible candidates. The first part of this thesis addresses an analytical approach to the scattering of acoustic and vortical waves on an infinite periodic arrangement of finite-length flat blades in parallel mean flow. This geometry serves as an unwrapped model of the fan components in turbo-machinery. Our contributions include a novel semi-analytical solution based on the Wiener–Hopf technique that extends previous work by lifting the restriction that adjacent blades overlap, and a comprehensive study of the composition of the outgoing energy flux for acoustic wave scattering on this array of blades. These results provide an insight into the importance of energy conversion between the unsteady vorticity shed from the trailing edges of the cascade blades and the acoustic field. Furthermore, we show that the balance of incoming and outgoing energy fluxes of the unsteady field provides a convenient tool for understanding several interesting scattering symmetries on this geometry. In the second part of the thesis, we focus on numerical techniques based on the boundary integral method which allows us to write the governing equations for zero mean flow in the form of Fredholm integral equations. We study the solution of these integral equations using collocation methods for two-dimensional scatterers with smooth and Lipschitz boundaries. Our contributions are as follows: Firstly, we explore the extent to which least-squares oversampling can improve collocation. We provide rigorous analysis that proves guaranteed convergence for small amounts of oversampling and shows that superlinear oversampling can ensure faster asymptotic convergence rates of the method. Secondly, we examine the computation of the entries in the discrete linear system representing the continuous integral equation in collocation methods for hybrid numerical-asymptotic basis spaces on simple geometric shapes in the context of high-frequency wave scattering. This requires the computation of singular highly-oscillatory integrals and we develop efficient numerical methods that can compute these integrals at frequency-independent cost. Finally, we provide a general result that allows the construction of recurrences for the efficient computation of quadrature moments in a broad class of Filon quadrature methods, and we show how this framework can also be used to accelerate certain Levin quadrature methods.Supported by EPSRC grant EP/L016516/

Differential/Difference Equations

The study of oscillatory phenomena is an important part of the theory of differential equations. Oscillations naturally occur in virtually every area of applied science including, e.g., mechanics, electrical, radio engineering, and vibrotechnics. This Special Issue includes 19 high-quality papers with original research results in theoretical research, and recent progress in the study of applied problems in science and technology. This Special Issue brought together mathematicians with physicists, engineers, as well as other scientists. Topics covered in this issue: Oscillation theory; Differential/difference equations; Partial differential equations; Dynamical systems; Fractional calculus; Delays; Mathematical modeling and oscillations

Asymptotic and numerical methods for high-frequency scattering problems

This thesis is concerned with the development, analysis and implementation of efficient and accurate numerical methods for solving high-frequency acoustic scattering problems. Classical boundary or finite element methods that are based on approximating the solution by polynomials can be effective for small and moderate frequencies. However, as the frequency increases, the solution to the scattering problem becomes more oscillatory and classical numerical methods cope very badly with high oscillation. For example, for two-dimensional scattering problems, classical numerical methods require their number of degrees of freedom to grow at least linearly with frequency to capture the oscillatory behaviour of the solution accurately. Therefore, at large frequencies, classical numerical methods become essentially numerically intractable. In order to overcome the limitations of classical methods, one can seek to incorporate the known asymptotic behaviour of the solution in the numerical method. This involves using asymptotic theory to determine the oscillatory part of the solution and then using classical numerical methods to approximate the slowly varying remainder. Such methods are often referred to as hybrid numerical-asymptotic methods. Determining the high frequency asymptotics of acoustic scattering problems is a classic problem in applied mathematics, with methods such as geometrical optics or the geometrical theory of diffraction providing asymptotic expansions of the solutions. Considerable amount of research has been directed towards both constructing these asymptotic expansions and proving error bounds for truncated asymptotic series of the solution, notably by Buslaev [23], Morawetz and Ludwig [78], and Melrose and Taylor [75], among others. Often, the oscillatory component of the solution can be determined explicitly from these asymptotic expansions. This can then be used in designing ecient hybrid methods. Furthermore, from the asymptotic expansions, frequency-dependent bounds on the slowly-varying remainder and its derivatives can be obtained (in some cases these follow directly from classical results, in other cases some additional work is required). The frequency-dependent bounds are the key results used in the frequency-explicit numerical error analysis of the approximation of the slowly-varying remainder. This thesis presents a rigorous justification of one of the key result using only elementary techniques. Hybrid numerical-asymptotic methods have been shown in theory to be substantially more efficient than classical numerical methods alone. For example, [40] presented a hybrid numerical-asymptotic method in the context of boundary integral equations (BIEs) for solving the problem of high-frequency scattering by smooth, convex obstacles in two dimensions. It was proved in [40] that in order to maintain the accuracy as the frequency increases, the hybrid BIE method requires the number of degrees of freedom to grow slightly faster than k1=9, where k is a parameter proportional to the frequency. This is a substantial improvement from the classical boundary integral methods that require O(k) number of degrees of freedom to achieve the same accuracy for this problem. Despite this slow growth in the number of degrees of freedom, hybrid numerical-asymptotic methods lead to stiffness matrices with entries that are highly-oscillatory singular integrals that can not be computed exactly. Thus, without efficient and accurate numerical treatment of these integrals, the hybrid numerical-asymptotic methods, regardless of their attractive theoretical accuracy, can not be efficiently implemented in practice. In order to resolve this difficulty, this thesis develops a methodology for approximating the integrals arising from hybrid methods in the context of BIEs. The integrals are transformed under a change of variables into integrals amenable to Filon-type quadratures. Filon-type quadratures are designed to cope well with high oscillations in the integrands. Then, graded meshes are used to capture the singularities accurately. Along with k-explicit error bounds for the integration methods, this thesis derives k-explicit error bounds for the hybrid BIE methods that incorporate the error of the inexact approximation of the entries of the stiffness matrix. The error bounds suggest that, with an appropriate choice of parameters of Filon quadrature and mesh grading, the overall error of the hybrid method does not deteriorate due to inexact approximation of the stiffness matrix, therefore preserving its attractive theoretical convergence properties.EThOS - Electronic Theses Online ServiceGBUnited Kingdo

Numerical methods for computing Casimir interactions

We review several different approaches for computing Casimir forces and related fluctuation-induced interactions between bodies of arbitrary shapes and materials. The relationships between this problem and well known computational techniques from classical electromagnetism are emphasized. We also review the basic principles of standard computational methods, categorizing them according to three criteria---choice of problem, basis, and solution technique---that can be used to classify proposals for the Casimir problem as well. In this way, mature classical methods can be exploited to model Casimir physics, with a few important modifications.Comment: 46 pages, 142 references, 5 figures. To appear in upcoming Lecture Notes in Physics book on Casimir Physic

Numerical aspects of enriched and high-order boundary element basis functions for Helmholtz problems.

In this thesis several aspects of the Partition of Unity Boundary Element Method (PUBEM) are investigated, with novel results in three main areas: 1. Enriched modelling of wave scattering from polygonal obstacles. The plane waves are augmented by a set of enrichment functions formed from fractional order Bessel functions, as informed by classical asymptotic solutions for wave fields in the vicinity of sharp corners. It is shown that the solution accuracy can be improved markedly by the addition of a very small number of these enrichment functions, with very little effect on the run time. 2. High-order formulations. Plane waves are not the only effective means of introducing oscillatory approximation spaces. High-Order Lagrange polynomials and high-order Non-Uniform Rational B-Splines (NURBS) also exhibit oscillation and these are tested and compared against PUBEM. It is found that these high-order functions significantly outperform the corresponding low-order (typically quadratic) polynomials and NURBS that are commonly used, and that for large problems the highest order tested (11th) has potential to be competitive with PUBEM without the associated ill-conditioning. 3. Integration. The accuracy of PUBEM traditionally comes at the cost of the requirement to evaluate many highly-oscillatory integrals. Several candidate integration strategies are investigated with the aim of find- ing a robust, accurate and efficient approach. Schemes tested include the Filon and asymptotic methods, as well as the Method of Stationary Phase (MSP). Although these schemes are found to be spectacularly successful for many cases, they fail for a sufficient number of situations to cause a complete PUBEM analysis based on these methods to lack robustness. Conclusions are drawn about the effective use of more traditional quadrature for robust implementations