On solvability of a boundary integral equation of the first kind for Dirichlet boundary value problems in plane elasticity

The solution of a Dirichlet boundary value problem of plane isotropic elasticity by the boundary integral equation (BIE) of the first kind obtained from the Somigliana identity is considered. The logarithmic function appearing in the integral kernel leads to the possibility of this operator being non-invertible, the solution of the BIE either being non-unique or not existing. Such a situation occurs if the size of the boundary coincides with the so-called critical (or degenerate) scale for a certain form of the fundamental solution used. Techniques for the evaluation of these critical scales and for the removal of the non-uniqueness appearing in the problems with critical scales solved by the BIE of the first kind are proposed and analysed, and some recommendations for BEM code programmers based on the analysis presented are given.     

A dual BIE approach for large‐scale modelling of 3‐D electrostatic problems with the fast multipole boundary element method

A dual boundary integral equation (BIE) formulation is presented for the analysis of general 3‐D electrostatic problems, especially those involving thin structures. This dual BIE formulation uses a linear combination of the conventional BIE and hypersingular BIE on the entire boundary of a problem domain. Similar to crack problems in elasticity, the conventional BIE degenerates when the field outside a thin body is investigated, such as the electrostatic field around a thin conducting plate. The dual BIE formulation, however, does not degenerate in such cases. Most importantly, the dual BIE is found to have better conditioning for the equations using the boundary element method (BEM) compared with the conventional BIE, even for domains with regular shapes. Thus the dual BIE is well suited for implementation with the fast multipole BEM. The fast multipole BEM for the dual BIE formulation is developed based on an adaptive fast multiple approach for the conventional BIE. Several examples are studied with the fast multipole BEM code, including finite and infinite domain problems, bulky and thin plate structures, and simplified comb‐drive models having more than 440 thin beams with the total number of equations above 1.45 million and solved on a PC. The numerical results clearly demonstrate that the dual BIE is very effective in solving general 3‐D electrostatic problems, as well as special cases involving thin perfect conducting structures, and that the adaptive fast multipole BEM with the dual BIE formulation is very efficient and promising in solving large‐scale electrostatic problems. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

TREATMENT OF BODY-FORCE VOLUME INTEGRALS IN BEM BY EXACT TRANSFORMATION FOR 2-D ANISOTROPIC ELASTICITY

In the Boundary Element Method (BEM) based on the direct formulation, body-force effects manifest themselves as an additional volume integral term in the Boundary Integral Equation (BIE). The numerical solution of the integral equation with this term destroys the notion of the BEM as atruly boundary solution method. This paper discusses the treatment of this volume integral for two-dimensional anisotropic elasticity with body-forces present. The analytical basis for transforming this integral exactly into boundary ones is presented for geometrically convex regions. This restores the application of the BEM to such problems as a truly boundary solution technique. Numerical examples are presented to demonstrate the veracity of the transformation and implementation. © 1997 by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Analytical integration of the moments in the diagonal form fast multipole boundary element method for 3-D acoustic wave problems

A diagonal form fast multipole boundary element method (BEM) is presented in this paper for solving 3-D acoustic wave problems based on the Burton-Miller boundary integral equation (BIE) formulation. Analytical expressions of the moments in the diagonal fast multipole BEM are derived for constant elements, which are shown to be more accurate, stable and efficient than those using direct numerical integration. Numerical examples show that using the analytical moments can reduce the CPU time by a lot as compared with that using the direct numerical integration. The percentage of CPU time reduction largely depends on the proportion of the time used for moments calculation to the overall solution time. Several examples are studied to investigate the effectiveness and efficiency of the developed diagonal fast multipole BEM as compared with earlier p³ fast multipole method BEM, including a scattering problem of a dolphin modeled with 404,422 boundary elements and a radiation problem of a train wheel track modeled with 257,972 elements. These realistic, large-scale BEM models clearly demonstrate the effectiveness, efficiency and potential of the developed diagonal form fast multipole BEM for solving large-scale acoustic wave problems.     

An Analytical Method for Computing the One-Dimensional Backward Wave Problem

The present paper reveals a new computational method for the illposed backward wave problem. The Fourier series is used to formulate a first-kind Fredholm integral equation for the unknown initial data of velocity. Then, we consider a direct regularization to obtain a second-kind Fredholm integral equation. The termwise separable property of kernel function allows us to obtain an analytical solution of regularization type. The sufficient condition of the data for the existence and uniqueness of solution is derived. The error estimate of the regularization solution is provided. Some numerical results illustrate the performance of the new method.     

Thermal analysis of carbon-nanotube composites using a rigid-line inclusion model by the boundary integral equation method

The boundary integral equation (BIE) method is applied for the thermal analysis of fiber-reinforced composites, particularly the carbon-nanotube (CNT) composites, based on a rigid-line inclusion model. The steady state heat conduction equation is solved using the BIE in a two-dimensional infinite domain containing line inclusions which are assumed to have a much higher thermal conductivity (like CNTs) than that of the host medium. Thus the temperature along the length of a line inclusion can be assumed constant. In this way, each inclusion can be regarded as a rigid line (the opposite of a crack) in the medium. It is shown that, like the crack case, the hypersingular (derivative) BIE can be applied to model these rigid lines. The boundary element method (BEM), accelerated with the fast multipole method, is used to solve the established hypersingular BIE. Numerical examples with up to 10,000 rigid lines (with 1,000,000 equations), are successfully solved by the BEM code on a laptop computer. Effective thermal conductivity of fiber-reinforced composites are evaluated using the computed temperature and heat flux fields. These numerical results are compared with the analytical solution for a single inclusion case and with the experimental one reported in the literature for carbon-nanotube composites for multiple inclusion cases. Good agreements are observed in both situations, which clearly demonstrates the potential of the developed approach in large-scale modeling of fiber-reinforced composites, particularly that of the emerging carbon-nanotube composites.     

A new fast multipole boundary element method for solving large‐scale two‐dimensional elastostatic problems

A new fast multipole boundary element method (BEM) is presented in this paper for large‐scale analysis of two‐dimensional (2‐D) elastostatic problems based on the direct boundary integral equation (BIE) formulation. In this new formulation, the fundamental solution for 2‐D elasticity is written in a complex form using the two complex potential functions in 2‐D elasticity. In this way, the multipole and local expansions for 2‐D elasticity BIE are directly linked to those for 2‐D potential problems. Furthermore, their translations (moment to moment, moment to local, and local to local) turn out to be exactly the same as those in the 2‐D potential case. This formulation is thus very compact and more efficient than other fast multipole approaches for 2‐D elastostatic problems using Taylor series expansions of the fundamental solution in its original form. Several numerical examples are presented to study the accuracy and efficiency of the developed fast multipole BEM formulation and code. BEM models with more than one million equations have been solved successfully on a laptop computer. These results clearly demonstrate the potential of the developed fast multipole BEM for solving large‐scale 2‐D elastostatic problems. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

On the conventional boundary integral equation formulation for piezoelectric solids with defects or of thin shapes

In this paper, the conventional boundary integral equation (BIE) formulation for piezoelectric solids is revisited and the related issues are examined. The key relations employed in deriving the piezoelectric BIE, such as the generalized Green's identity (reciprocal work theorem) and integral identities for the piezoelectric fundamental solution, are established rigorously. A weakly singular form of the piezoelectric BIE is derived for the first time using the identities for the fundamental solution, which eliminates the calculation of any singular integrals in the piezoelectric boundary element method (BEM). The crucial question of whether or not the piezoelectric BIE will degenerate when applied to crack and thin shell-like problems is addressed. It is shown analytically that the conventional BIE for piezoelectricity does degenerate for crack problems, but does not degenerate for thin piezoelectric shells. The latter has significant implications in applications of the piezoelectric BIE to the analysis of thin piezoelectric films used widely as sensors and actuators. Numerical tests to show the degeneracy of the piezoelectric BIE for crack problems are presented and one remedy to this degeneracy by using the multi-domain BEM is also demonstrated.     

Traction BIE solutions for flat cracks

The paper deals with the numerical solution techniques for the traction boundary integral equation (BIE), which describes the opening (and sliding) displacements of the surface of the traction loaded crack or arbitrary planform embedded in an elastic infinite body (buried crack problem). The traction BIE is a singular integral equation of the first kind for the displacement gradients. Its solution poses a number of numerical problems, such as the presence of derivatives of the unknown function in the integral equation, the modeling of the crack front displacement gradient singularity, and the regularization of the equation's singular kernels. All of the above problems have been addressed and solved. Details of the algorithm are provided. Numerical results of a number of crack configurations are presented, demonstrating high accuracy of the method.     

Identities for the fundamental solution of thin plate bending problems and the nonuniqueness of the hypersingular BIE solution for multi-connected domains

Four integral identities for the fundamental solution of thin plate bending problems are presented in this paper. These identities can be derived by imposing rigid-body translation and rotation solutions to the two direct boundary integral equations (BIEs) for plate bending problems, or by integrating directly the governing equation for the fundamental solution. These integral identities can be used to develop weakly-singular and nonsingular forms of the BIEs for plate bending problems. They can also be employed to show the nonuniqueness of the solution of the hypersingular BIE for plates on multi-connected (or multiply-connected) domains. This nonuniqueness is shown for the first time in this paper. It is shown that the solution of the singular (deflection) BIE is unique, while the hypersingular (rotation) BIE can admit an arbitrary rigid-body translation term in the deflection solution, on the edge of a hole. However, since both the singular and hypersingular BIEs are required in solving a plate bending problem using the boundary element method (BEM), the BEM solution is always unique on edges of holes in plates on multi-connected domains. Numerical examples of plates with holes are presented to show the correctness and effectiveness of the BEM for multi-connected domain problems.     

A boundary element-free method (BEFM) for two-dimensional potential problems

Combining the boundary integral equation (BIE) method and improved moving least-squares (IMLS) approximation, a direct meshless BIE method, which is called the boundary element-free method (BEFM), for two-dimensional potential problems is discussed in this paper. In the IMLS approximation, the weighted orthogonal functions are used as the basis functions; then the algebra equation system is not ill-conditioned and can be solved without obtaining the inverse matrix. Based on the IMLS approximation and the BIE for two-dimensional potential problems, the formulae of the BEFM are given. The BEFM is a direct numerical method in which the basic unknown quantity is the real solution of the nodal variables, and the boundary conditions can be applied directly and easily; thus, it gives a greater computational precision. Some numerical examples are presented to demonstrate the method.     

A simple a-posteriori error estimation for adaptive BEM in elasticity

In this paper, the properties of various boundary integral operators are investigated for error estimation in adaptive BEM. It is found that the residual of the hyper-singular boundary integral equation (BIE) can be used for a-posteriori error estimation for different kinds of problems. Based on this result, a new a-posteriori error indicator is proposed which is a measure of the difference of two solutions for boundary stresses in elastic BEM. The first solution is obtained by the conventional boundary stress calculation method, and the second one by use of the regularized hyper-singular BIE for displacement derivative. The latter solution has recently been found to be of high accuracy and can be easily obtained under the most commonly used C ⁰ continuous elements. This new error indicator is defined by a L ₁ norm of the difference between the two solutions under Mises stress sense. Two typical numerical examples have been performed for two-dimensional (2D) elasticity problems and the results show that the proposed error indicator successfully tracks the real numerical errors and effectively leads a h-type mesh refinement procedure.     

An ancillary boundary integral equation for magnetostatic analysis

The boundary element method (BEM) has been established as an effective means for magnetostatic analysis. Direct BEM formulations for the magnetic vector potential have been developed over the past 20 years. There is a less well-known direct boundary integral equation (BIE) for the magnetic flux density which can be derived by taking the curl of the BIE for the magnetic vector potential and applying properties of the scalar triple product. On first inspection, the ancillary boundary integral equation for the magnetic flux density appears to be homogeneous, but it can be shown that the equation is well-posed and non-homogeneous using appropriate boundary conditions. In the current research, the use of the ancillary boundary integral equation for the magnetic flux density is investigated as a stand-alone equation and in tandem with the direct formulation for the magnetic vector potential.     

Analytical study and numerical experiments for degenerate scale problems in the boundary element method for two‐dimensional elasticity

For a plane elasticity problem, the boundary integral equation approach has been shown to yield a non‐unique solution when geometry size is equal to a degenerate scale. In this paper, the degenerate scale problem in the boundary element method (BEM) is analytically studied using the method of stress function. For the elliptic domain problem, the numerical difficulty of the degenerate scale can be solved by using the hypersingular formulation instead of using the singular formulation in the dual BEM. A simple example is shown to demonstrate the failure using the singular integral equations of dual BEM. It is found that the degenerate scale also depends on the Poisson's ratio. By employing the hypersingular formulation in the dual BEM, no degenerate scale occurs since a zero eigenvalue is not embedded in the influence matrix for any case. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A pure boundary element method approach for solving hypersingular boundary integral equations

This paper is concerned with discretization and numerical solution of a regularized version of the hypersingular boundary integral equation (HBIE) for the two-dimensional Laplace equation. This HBIE contains the primary unknown, as well as its gradient, on the boundary of a body. Traditionally, this equation has been solved by combining the boundary element method (BEM) together with tangential differentiation of the interpolated primary variable on the boundary. The present paper avoids this tangential differentiation. Instead, a “pure” BEM method is proposed for solving this class of problems. Dirichlet, Neumann and mixed problems are addressed in this paper, and some numerical examples are included in it.     

Boundary element based formulations for crack shape sensitivity analysis

The present paper addresses several BIE-based or BIE-oriented formulations for sensitivity analysis of integral functionals with respect to the geometrical shape of a crack. Functionals defined in terms of integrals over the external boundary of a cracked body and involving the solution of a frequency-domain boundary-value elastodynamic problem are considered, but the ideas presented in this paper are applicable, with the appropriate modifications, to other kinds of linear field equations as well. Both direct differentiation and adjoint problem techniques are addressed, with recourse to either collocation or symmetric Galerkin BIE formulations. After a review of some basic concepts about shape sensitivity and material differentiation, the derivative integral equations for the elastodynamic crack problem are discussed in connection with both collocation and symmetric Galerkin BIE formulations. Building upon these results, the direct differentiation and the adjoint solution approaches are then developed. In particular, the adjoint solution approach is presented in three different forms compatible with boundary element method (BEM) analysis of crack problems, based on the discretized collocation BEM equations, the symmetric Galerkin BEM equations and the direct and adjoint stress intensity factors, respectively. The paper closes with a few comments.     

A boundary point interpolation method for stress analysis of solids

 A boundary point interpolation method (BPIM) is proposed for solving boundary value problems of solid mechanics. In the BPIM, the boundary of a problem domain is represented by properly scattered nodes. The boundary integral equation (BIE) for 2-D elastostatics has been discretized using point interpolants based only on a group of arbitrarily distributed boundary points. In the present BPIM formulation, the shape functions constructed using polynomial basis function in a curvilinear coordinate possess Dirac delta function property. The boundary conditions can be implemented with ease as in the conventional boundary element method (BEM). The BPIM for 2-D elastostatics has been coded in FORTRAN, and used to obtain numerical results for stress analysis of two-dimensional solids. Received 10 January 2000     

Boundary Integral Equation for Eddy-Current Problems with Dirichlet Boundary Condition

A boundary integral equation (BIE) is developed for the eddy-current (EC) problems with Dirichlet boundary condition by considering the difference between the field without cracks and the one with cracks. Once the field and its normal derivative are given for the structure in the absence of cracks, normal derivative of the scattered field on the surface can be calculated by solving this integral equation numerically. For infinite-domain problems, this equation is more efficient than the conventional BIE due to a smaller computational region needed. Four kinds of two-dimensional EC problems have been solved using this integral equation. The surface impedance for different cases is presented in this paper. Numerical results are compared with analytical solutions and published numerical results. There are good agreements between them. Also, this concept can be extended to three-dimensional problems with other boundary conditions.     

Non-singular boundary integral equation implementation

The basis of the boundary integral equation (BIE) development is the singular field solution for the Kelvin point load problem. The presence of the mathematical singularity in an otherwise non-singular problem has created over the years a variety of numerical coping strategies. The current paper extends some of the earlier works in a simple manner that eliminates the mathematical singularity through analytical integration of the critical terms. The resulting formulation is fully non-singular and is shown to be amenable to simple, low-order Gaussian integration. The critical class of problems involving thin sections and/or highly graded BIE meshes now can be solved without previous problems and concerns the accuracy of the numerical integrations used in creating the linear BIE equations. Extension of the formulation approach to remove hypersingular formulation problems in fracture mechanics is seen to be a future beneficiary of the semi-analytical BIE implementation reported herein.     

Dual BIE approaches for modeling electrostatic MEMS problems with thin beams and accelerated by the fast multipole method

Three boundary integral equation (BIE) formulations are investigated for the analysis of electrostatic fields exterior to thin-beam structures as found in some micro-electro-mechanical systems (MEMS). The three BIE formulations are: (1) the regular BIE using only the single-layer potential; (2) the dual BIE (a) using the regular BIE on one surface of a beam and the gradient BIE on the other surface; and (3) the dual BIE (b) using a linear combination of the regular BIE and gradient BIE on all the surfaces of the beam. Similar to crack problems in elasticity, the regular BIE degenerates when the beam thickness tends to zero, while the two dual BIE formulations do not degenerate. Most importantly, the dual BIE (b) is found to be well conditioned for all the values of the beam thickness, and thus well suited for implementation with the fast multipole BEM. The fast multipole BEM for both the regular BIE and the dual BIE (b) formulations are developed and tested on a simplified comb-drive model. The numerical results clearly show that the dual BIEs are very effective in solving MEMS problems with thin beams and the fast multipole BEM with the dual BIE (b) formulation is very efficient in solving large-scale MEMS models.