Boundary element procedure for computation of internal directional derivatives in homogeneous Laplace's problems solved by the finite element method

The boundary element method (BEM) is an efficient numerical method that approximates solutions of various boundary value problems. Despite its success little research has been performed on the conditioning of the linear systems that appear in the BEM. For a Laplace equation with Dirichlet boundary conditions a remarkable phenomenon is observed; the corresponding boundary integral equation (BIE) is singular for a certain critical size of the 2D domain. As a consequence the discrete counterpart of the BIE, the linear system, is singular too, or at least ill-conditioned. This is reflected by the condition number of the system matrix, which is infinitely large, or at least very large. When the condition number of the BEM-matrix is large, the linear system is difficult to solve and the solution of the system is very sensible to perturbations in the boundary data. For a Laplace equation with mixed boundary conditions a similar phenomenon is observed. The corresponding BEM-matrix consists of two blocks; one block originates from the BEM-matrix belonging to the Dirichlet problem, the other block originates from the BEM-matrix belonging to the Neumann problem. The composite matrix inherits the solvability problems from the Dirichlet block. In other words, for the Laplace equation with mixed boundary conditions there exists also a critical size of the 2D domain for which the BEM-matrix has an infinitely large condition number. Hence the size and shape of the domain affects the solvability of the BEM problem. The critical size of the domain for which the BIE becomes singular is related to the logarithmic capacity of the domain. The logarithmic capacity is a positive real number that is a function of the size and shape of the domain. If this logarithmic capacity is equal to one, the domain is a critical domain, and for this domain the BIE becomes singular. Thus by computing the logarithmic capacity we can a-priori determine whether the BIE will be singular or not. The logarithmic capacity depends linearly on the scale of the domain, and thus a domain with logarithmic capacity equal to one can always be found by rescaling the domain. Unfortunately the logarithmic capacity can only be computed analytically for a few simple domains; for more involved domains the logarithmic capacity can be estimated though. There are several possibilities to avoid large condition numbers, i.e. singular BIEs that appear at critical domains. The first option is to rescale the domain such that the logarithmic capacity is unequal to one. One can also add a supplementary condition to the BIE and the linear system. A drawback of this option is that the linear system has more equations than unknowns and different techniques are required to solve the system. A third option is to slightly modify the fundamental solution of the Laplace operator. This fundamental solution directly appears in the BIE and it can be shown that a suitable modification yields BIEs that do not become singular. The critical domains for which the BIEs become singular do not restrict to Laplace equations only. Also for BIEs applied to the biharmonic equation or the elastostatic equations and the Stokes equations such critical domains exist. As the last two equations are vectorial equations, also the corresponding BIE consists of two equations. As a consequence two critical domains can be found for which these BIEs become singular. To obtain nonsingular BIEs techniques similar to the Laplace case can be used. Unfortunately we cannot a-priori determine the sizes for which the BIEs becomes singular, and thus do not know to what size we should rescale the domain to obtain nonsingular BIEs. The existence of critical domains is in essence caused by the logarithmic term in the fundamental solutions for the elliptic boundary value problems in 2D. This logarithmic term does not depend linearly on the size of the domain. When a domain is scaled, i.e. multiplied by a scale factor, the argument of the logarithm is also multiplied by this scale factor, but the logarithm turns this into an additive term. Thus the logarithm transforms multiplication into addition. This affects the BIEs in such a way that critical domains can appear. The fundamental solutions of boundary value problems in 3D do not contain a logarithmic term. Hence scaling of the domain does not affect the fundamental solution, and consequently also the BIE is not affected. Hence we may safely rescale 3D domains without the risk to encounter a critical domain. An example in which a domain takes many different sizes and shapes is the blowing problem. In this problem a viscous fluid is blown to a desired shape. Typically the time is discretised into a set of discrete time steps, and at each step the shape of the fluid is computed by solving the Stokes equations. When attempting to simulate this problem in 2D, we meet a large number of 2D domains, and we risk that one of these domains is equal to or approaches a critical domain. In such a case the BEM will have difficulties with solving the Stokes equations for that particular domain. When simulating the blowing problem in 3D, no critical domains are encountered. It turns out that the BEM is a very efficient numerical method for this particular 3D problem with a moving boundary. As we are merely interested in the shape of the fluid, we only need to know the flow of its boundary. The BEM does exactly that; it does not compute the flow at the interior of the fluid. Furthermore it is rather easy to include other effects from the blowing problem in the model, such as gravity, surface tension and friction from the contact of the fluid with a wall. As only the boundary of the fluid is discretised, the system matrices that appear in the BEM are smaller than the system matrices that appear when solving the problem with a finite element method, for example. Though the BEM-matrices are dense, while the finite element matrices are sparse, the computational effort for the BEM is relatively low. In short, the BEMis a very appropriate numerical method when solving blowing problems.

A Monte Carlo solution method for linear elasticity

A finite element–boundary element method for advection–diffusion problems with variable advective fields and infinite domains

In the boundary element method (BEM) for stress analysis, it is well known that thermal loads give rise to an additional volume integral in the primary form of the boundary integral equation (BIE). This volume integral needs to be further transformed to surface ones in order to retain the characteristic of the BEM as a boundary solution technique. In this study of the BEM for 3D thermoelasticity in general anisotropy, the fundamental solutions are expressed as Fourier series with coefficients calculated using an explicit-form Green’s function. In the exact volume-to-surface integral transformation associated with the term for the thermal effects in the BIE, a new kernel function is constructed. All formulations are implemented in an existing BEM code for 3D elastostatic analysis. Some numerical examples are presented to demonstrate the veracity of the formulations and the implementation, where the numerical results are compared with those obtained using the finite element method (FEM).

Boundary Element Analysis of Cracks in Shear Deformable Plates and Shells. Topics in Engineering, Vol 43

On the convergence of the dual reciprocity boundary element method

When a vibrating thin structure moves in a heavy flow field, the effect of sound waves on the structure cannot be ignored. This effect is especially pronounced when the relative velocity of the structure and the flow field increases. The hybrid numerical method of finite element method (FEM) and convective boundary element method (BEM) is proposed to solve acoustic-structural interaction problems in uniform relative motion between structure source and fluid. Besides, an acoustic-analogy Lorentz transform is proposed to handle the direct convective boundary integral equation (BIE), which makes the convective BIE has the same form as traditional BIE so that there are no more convective terms and extra singular integrals. The continuity condition at the fluid-structure interface is also proposed to generate the coupling equation. Compared with the traditional FEM, this hybrid method has the advantages of greatly reducing the number of finite elements outside the structure as well as automatically satisfying the radiation condition at far field. And compared with the direct convective BIE, this method reduces the computational complexity and time. It is potential to deliver a solver with higher accuracy and less memory consumption. Some numerical examples are designed to study the influence of the convective effect. Keywords: Acoustic-structural interaction, Finite element method, Boundary element method, FEM-BEM coupling

The spurious eigenvalues of an annular domain have been verified for the singular and hypersingular boundary‐element methods (BEMs) and circumvented by using the Burton‐Miller approach. Do they also occur in other formulations: continuous formulations such as the singular and hypersingular boundary integral equations (BIEs), the null‐field BIEs and the fictitious BIEs, or such discrete formulations as the null‐field BEMs and the fictitious BEMs? For the ten formulations of the multiply connected problem the study of otherwise the same issues is continued in the present paper. By using the degenerate kernels and the Fourier series, it is demonstrated analytically for the six continuous formulations of BIEs that spurious eigensolutions depend on the geometry of the inner boundary but not on that of the outer boundary. This conclusion can be extended to the six discrete formulations of BEMs. To filter out the spurious eigenvalues, the CHIEF (combined Helmholtz integral equation formulation) method is used here instead of the Burton‐Miller approach. The optimum number and appropriate positions of the CHIEF points are also addressed. It is then shown that, in the null‐field and fictitious BEMs, the spurious and true eigenvalues can be detected and distinguished by using the singular‐value‐decomposition‐updating techniques in conjunction with the Fredholm alternative theorem. Illustrative examples show the validity of the proposed methodologies.

Solution of the dam-reservoir interaction problem using a combination of FEM, BEM with particular integrals, modal analysis and substructuring

A State Space Boundary Element Method with Analytical Formulas for Nearly Singular Integrals

In linear poroelasticity so far only collocation boundary element methods have been available. However, in some applications, e.g., when coupling with finite elements is desired, a symmetric formulation is preferable. Choosing a Galerkin approach which involves the second boundary integral equation, such a formulation is possible. Here, a previously presented integration by part technique for the regularization of the first boundary integral equation is extended to the second boundary integral equation as well. While the weakly singular representation of the double layer operator has been presented before, the emphasis lies here on the so called hyper‐singular boundary integral operator. Due to the regularization, this operator can be evaluated numerically and, hence, be used within a numerical scheme for the first time. Different numerical studies will be presented to show the behavior of the established symmetric Galerkin boundary element method, also comparing it with collocation boundary element methods. (© 2011 Wiley‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)

SummaryThis paper presents a numerical approach for the design sensitivity analysis of modal frequencies of elastic structures submerged in an unbounded heavy fluid domain. Because the feedback of sound pressure onto the fluid‐loaded structures has to be taken into account in this case, a fully coupled scheme which combines the structural finite element method (FEM) and the acoustic boundary element method (BEM) is employed in the numerical simulation. The resulting nonlinear eigenvalue problem created by the coupled finite element and boundary element (FE‐BE) method is converted into a generalized eigenvalue problem (GEP) of reduced dimension by using a contour integral method. The design sensitivity formulation for non‐repeated eigenvalues is derived based on an adjoint method which uses both the left and right eigenvectors, and a small GEP is formed to calculate the gradients of repeated eigenvalues. The Burton‐Miller formulation is employed to shift the fictitious eigenfrequencies and their derivatives, and the parameter setting which is beneficial to the filtering of fictitious eigenfrequencies is investigated. Numerical examples are given to verify the accuracy and effectiveness of the developed method.

The use of modal methods to determine acoustic transient and harmonic radiation and scattering from fluid loaded shells of revolution will be reviewed. Using such methods the velocity field of a fluid loaded shell is first expressed as an invacuo modal vector expansion where the modes are determined either analytically for simple structures or via finite element methods for more complex structures. Boundary element or other methods are subsequently used to evaluate mode-dependent acoustic radiation impedances and impulse responses which account for the coupling of the fluid. In contrast to the harmonic problem which results in sets of algebraic equations for the coefficients of the modal expansion, the transient problem results in sets of coupled time-dependent convolution integral equations for the time-dependent coefficients. Our experience in solving both two- and three-dimensional radiation and scattering problems using modal methods will be reviewed. Numerical results for a wide variety of two- and three-dimensional radiation and scattering problems will be presented. In particular results will be presented and discussed for cylindrical, spherical, and spheroidal shells.

A coupled system of finite elements and boundary elements is presented for the modelling of sound propagation in a nonuniform mean flow. Finite elements are used to discretize the acoustic pressure in a bounded computational domain including the nonuniform flow field. The radiation of acoustic waves in the exterior uniform flow field is modelled by a boundary integral representation formula. The interface condition on the shared boundary yields an integral equation which is solved using boundary elements. The coupling of finite elements and boundary elements is described in detail for sound propagation in a stationary fluid where the acoustic pressure is governed by the Helmholtz equation. The coupled computational system is applied to estimate scattering and refractive effects on the acoustic pressure waves through a boundary layer surrounding an aircraft’s fuselage. The coupled mathematical formulation for three dimensional sound radiation around an engine in subsonic flow is discussed.

Finite element method (FEM) is widely used in the modeling of electromagnetic systems and as a reliable method to verify analytical modeling of electromagnetic devices in design step. As the method is based on discretization of domains, the electromagnetic continuity conditions at the boundaries of elements should be confirmed. Electromagnetic continuity conditions in FEM modeling were investigated in this article. It was shown that the continuity of tangential component of magnetic field intensity is not guaranteed at the boundaries of elements. The inability of FEM to establish the continuity condition leads to some virtual surface current densities at the boundaries of adjacent elements which does not exist in reality. The existence of virtual surface currents is proved in an example. Then, with the help of a complicated example, it is shown that large number of elements and, consequently, the large number of boundaries between elements may cause great errors in FEM postprocess results, especially in calculating magnetic stored energy and electromagnetic forces acting on moving parts. It has been shown that it is very important to take into account the impact of these virtual current densities in energy conversion analysis by FEM.