Discontinuous Galerkin algorithms for fully kinetic plasmas

J. Juno, A. Hakim, J. TenBarge, E. Shi, W. Dorland

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

87 Scopus citations

Abstract

We present a new algorithm for the discretization of the non-relativistic Vlasov–Maxwell system of equations for the study of plasmas in the kinetic regime. Using the discontinuous Galerkin finite element method for the spatial discretization, we obtain a high order accurate solution for the plasma's distribution function. Time stepping for the distribution function is done explicitly with a third order strong-stability preserving Runge–Kutta method. Since the Vlasov equation in the Vlasov–Maxwell system is a high dimensional transport equation, up to six dimensions plus time, we take special care to note various features we have implemented to reduce the cost while maintaining the integrity of the solution, including the use of a reduced high-order basis set. A series of benchmarks, from simple wave and shock calculations, to a five dimensional turbulence simulation, are presented to verify the efficacy of our set of numerical methods, as well as demonstrate the power of the implemented features.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)110-147
Number of pages38
JournalJournal of Computational Physics
Volume353
DOIs
StatePublished - Jan 15 2018

All Science Journal Classification (ASJC) codes

  • Numerical Analysis
  • Modeling and Simulation
  • Physics and Astronomy (miscellaneous)
  • General Physics and Astronomy
  • Computer Science Applications
  • Computational Mathematics
  • Applied Mathematics

Keywords

  • Discontinuous Galerkin
  • Vlasov–Maxwell

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