Mayavi: 3D visualization of scientific data

International audienceMayavi is an open-source, general-purpose, 3D scientific visualization package. It seeks to provide easy and interactive tools for data visualization that fit with the scientific user's workflow. For this purpose, Mayavi provides several entry points: a full-blown interactive application; a Python library with both a MATLAB-like interface focused on easy scripting and a feature-rich object hierarchy; widgets associated with these objects for assembling in a domain-specific application, and plugins that work with a general purpose application-building framework. In this article, we present an overview of the various features of Mayavi, we then provide insight on the design and engineering decisions made in implementing Mayavi, and finally discuss a few novel applications

Efficient and Accurate Adaptive Resolution for Weakly-Compressible SPH

In this paper we propose an accurate, and computationally efficient method for incorporating adaptive spatial resolution into weakly-compressible Smoothed Particle Hydrodynamics (SPH) schemes. Particles are adaptively split and merged in an accurate manner while ensuring that the number of particles is not large for a given resolution. Critically, the method ensures that the number of neighbors of each particle is optimal, leading to an efficient algorithm. A set of background particles is used to specify either geometry-based spatial resolution or solution-based adaptive resolution. This allows us to simulate problems using particles having length variations of the order of 1:250 with much fewer particles than currently reported with other techniques. The method is designed to automatically adapt when any solid bodies move. The algorithms employed are fully parallel. We consider a suite of benchmark problems to demonstrate the accuracy of the approach. We then consider the classic problem of the flow past a circular cylinder at a range of Reynolds numbers and show that the proposed method produces accurate results with a significantly reduced number of particles. We provide an open source implementation and a fully reproducible manuscript.Comment: 44 pages, 32 figures, 3 table

How to train your solver: Verification of boundary conditions for smoothed particle hydrodynamics

The weakly compressible smoothed particle hydrodynamics (WCSPH) method has been employed to simulate various physical phenomena involving fluids and solids. Various methods have been proposed to implement the solid wall, inlet/outlet, and other boundary conditions. However, error estimation and the formal rates of convergence for these methods have not been discussed or examined carefully. In this paper, we use the method of manufactured solution (MMS) to verify the convergence properties of a variety of commonly employed of various solid, inlet, and outlet boundary implementations. In order to perform this study, we propose various manufactured solutions for different domains. On the basis of the convergence offered by these methods, we systematically propose a convergent WCSPH scheme along with suitable methods for implementing the boundary conditions. We also demonstrate the accuracy of the proposed scheme by using it to solve the flow past a circular cylinder. Along with other recent developments in the use of adaptive resolution, this paves the way for accurate and efficient simulation of incompressible or weakly-compressible fluid flows using the SPH method

Parallel adaptive weakly-compressible SPH for complex moving geometries

The use of adaptive spatial resolution to simulate flows of practical interest using Smoothed Particle Hydrodynamics (SPH) is of considerable importance. Recently, Muta and Ramachandran [1] have proposed an efficient adaptive SPH method which is capable of handling large changes in particle resolution. This allows the authors to simulate problems with much fewer particles than was possible earlier. The method was not demonstrated or tested with moving bodies or multiple bodies. In addition, the original method employed a large number of background particles to determine the spatial resolution of the fluid particles. In the present work we establish the formulation's effectiveness for simulating flow around stationary and moving geometries. We eliminate the need for the background particles in order to specify the geometry-based or solution-based adaptivity and we discuss the algorithms employed in detail. We consider a variety of benchmark problems, including the flow past two stationary cylinders, flow past different NACA airfoils at a range of Reynolds numbers, a moving square at various Reynolds numbers, and the flow past an oscillating cylinder. We also demonstrate different types of motions using single and multiple bodies. The source code is made available under an open source license, and our results are reproducible.Comment: 50 pages, 22 figures, 3 tables. Updated one figure (Fig. 9