Coupling techniques for nonlinear hyperbolic equations. IV. Multi-component coupling and multidimensional well-balanced schemes

This series of papers is devoted to the formulation and the approximation of coupling problems for nonlinear hyperbolic equations. The coupling across an interface in the physical space is formulated in term of an augmented system of partial differential equations. In an earlier work, this strategy allowed us to develop a regularization method based on a thick interface model in one space variable. In the present paper, we significantly extend this framework and, in addition, encompass equations in several space variables. This new formulation includes the coupling of several distinct conservation laws and allows for a possible covering in space. Our main contributions are, on one hand, the design and analysis of a well-balanced finite volume method on general triangulations and, on the other hand, a proof of convergence of this method toward entropy solutions, extending Coquel, Cockburn, and LeFloch's theory (restricted to a single conservation law without coupling). The core of our analysis is, first, the derivation of entropy inequalities as well as a discrete entropy dissipation estimate and, second, a proof of convergence toward the entropy solution of the coupling problem.Comment: 37 page

Multilevel iterative solvers for the edge finite element solution of the 3D Maxwell equation

In the edge vector finite element solution of the frequency domain Maxwell equations, the presence of a large kernel of the discrete rotor operator is known to ruin convergence of standard iterative solvers. We extend the approach of [1] and, using domain decomposition ideas, construct a multilevel iterative solver where the projection with respect to the kernel is combined with the use of a hierarchical representation of the vector finite elements. The new iterative scheme appears to be an efficient solver for the edge finite element solution of the frequency domain Maxwell equations. The solver can be seen as a variable preconditioner and, thus, accelerated by Krylov subspace techniques (e.g. GCR or FGMRES). We demonstrate the efficiency of our approach on a test problem with strong jumps in the conductivity. [1] R. Hiptmair. Multigrid method for Maxwell's equations. SIAM J. Numer. Anal., 36(1):204-225, 1999

A Toy Model for Testing Finite Element Methods to Simulate Extreme-Mass-Ratio Binary Systems

Extreme mass ratio binary systems, binaries involving stellar mass objects orbiting massive black holes, are considered to be a primary source of gravitational radiation to be detected by the space-based interferometer LISA. The numerical modelling of these binary systems is extremely challenging because the scales involved expand over several orders of magnitude. One needs to handle large wavelength scales comparable to the size of the massive black hole and, at the same time, to resolve the scales in the vicinity of the small companion where radiation reaction effects play a crucial role. Adaptive finite element methods, in which quantitative control of errors is achieved automatically by finite element mesh adaptivity based on posteriori error estimation, are a natural choice that has great potential for achieving the high level of adaptivity required in these simulations. To demonstrate this, we present the results of simulations of a toy model, consisting of a point-like source orbiting a black hole under the action of a scalar gravitational field.Comment: 29 pages, 37 figures. RevTeX 4.0. Minor changes to match the published versio

Harmonic Initial-Boundary Evolution in General Relativity

Computational techniques which establish the stability of an evolution-boundary algorithm for a model wave equation with shift are incorporated into a well-posed version of the initial-boundary value problem for gravitational theory in harmonic coordinates. The resulting algorithm is implemented as a 3-dimensional numerical code which we demonstrate to provide stable, convergent Cauchy evolution in gauge wave and shifted gauge wave testbeds. Code performance is compared for Dirichlet, Neumann and Sommerfeld boundary conditions and for boundary conditions which explicitly incorporate constraint preservation. The results are used to assess strategies for obtaining physically realistic boundary data by means of Cauchy-characteristic matching.Comment: 31 pages, 14 figures, submitted to Physical Review

A posteriori error analysis and adaptive non-intrusive numerical schemes for systems of random conservation laws

In this article we consider one-dimensional random systems of hyperbolic conservation laws. We first establish existence and uniqueness of random entropy admissible solutions for initial value problems of conservation laws which involve random initial data and random flux functions. Based on these results we present an a posteriori error analysis for a numerical approximation of the random entropy admissible solution. For the stochastic discretization, we consider a non-intrusive approach, the Stochastic Collocation method. The spatio-temporal discretization relies on the Runge--Kutta Discontinuous Galerkin method. We derive the a posteriori estimator using continuous reconstructions of the discrete solution. Combined with the relative entropy stability framework this yields computable error bounds for the entire space-stochastic discretization error. The estimator admits a splitting into a stochastic and a deterministic (space-time) part, allowing for a novel residual-based space-stochastic adaptive mesh refinement algorithm. We conclude with various numerical examples investigating the scaling properties of the residuals and illustrating the efficiency of the proposed adaptive algorithm

Formulation and convergence of the finite volume method for conservation laws on spacetimes with boundary

We study nonlinear hyperbolic conservation laws posed on a differential (n+1)-manifold with boundary referred to as a spacetime, and defined from a prescribed flux field of n-forms depending on a parameter (the unknown variable), a class of equations proposed by LeFloch and Okutmustur in 2008. Our main result is a proof of the convergence of the finite volume method for weak solutions satisfying suitable entropy inequalities. A main difference with previous work is that we allow for slices with a boundary and, in addition, introduce a new formulation of the finite volume method involving the notion of total flux functions. Under a natural global hyperbolicity condition on the flux field and the spacetime and by assuming that the spacetime admits a foliation by compact slices with boundary, we establish an existence and uniqueness theory for the initial and boundary value problem, and we prove a contraction property in a geometrically natural L1-type distance.Comment: 32 page

L∞(L∞)L^\infty(L^\infty)-boundedness of DG(pp)-solutions for nonlinear conservation laws with boundary conditions

We prove the $L^\infty(L^\infty)$-boundedness of a higher-order shock-capturing streamline-diffusion DG-method based on polynomials of degree $p\geq 0$ for general scalar conservation laws. The estimate is given for the case of several space dimensions and for conservation laws with initial and boundary conditions