A local boundary integral equation method for potential problems

Boundary integral equation (boundary element) methods have the advantage over other commonly used numerical methods that they do not require values of the unknowns at points within the solution domain to be computed. Further benefits would be obtained if attention could be confined to information at one small part of the boundary, the particular region of interest in a given problem. A local boundary integral equation method based on a Taylor series expansion of the unknown function is developed to do this for two-dimensional potential problems governed by Laplace's equation. Very accurate local values of the function and its derivatives can be obtained. The method should find particular application in the efficient refinement of approximate solutions obtained by other numerical techniques.     

Computation of stresses in non-homogeneous elastic solids by local integral equation method: a comparative study

The paper deals with the numerical implementation of local integral equations for solution of boundary value problems and interior computations of displacements and their gradients in functionally graded elastic solids. Two kinds of meshless approximations and one element based approximation are employed in various formulations. The numerical stability, accuracy, convergence of accuracy and cost efficiency are investigated in numerous test examples with exact benchmark solutions.     

A meshless local boundary integral equation method for solving transient elastodynamic problems

A new local boundary integral equation (LBIE) method for solving two dimensional transient elastodynamic problems is proposed. The method utilizes, for its meshless implementation, nodal points spread over the analyzed domain and employs the moving least squares (MLS) approximation for the interpolation of the interior and boundary variables. On the global boundary, displacements and tractions are treated as independent variables. The local integral representation of displacements at each nodal point contains both surface and volume integrals, since it employs the simple elastostatic fundamental solution and considers the acceleration term as a body force. On the local boundaries, tractions are avoided with the aid of the elastostatic companion solution. The collocation of the local boundary/volume integral equations at all the interior and boundary nodes leads to a final system of ordinary differential equations, which is solved stepwise by the -Wilson finite difference scheme. Direct numerical techniques for the accurate evaluation of both surface and volume integrals are employed and presented in detail. All the strongly singular integrals are computed directly through highly accurate integration techniques. Three representative numerical examples that demonstrate the accuracy of the proposed methodology are provided.     

A meshless local boundary integral equation method for two-dimensional steady elliptic problems

A novel meshless local boundary integral equation (LBIE) method is proposed for the numerical solution of two-dimensional steady elliptic problems, such as heat conduction, electrostatics or linear elasticity. The domain is discretized by a distribution of boundary and internal nodes. From this nodal points’ cloud a “background” mesh is created by a triangulation algorithm. A local form of the singular boundary integral equation of the conventional boundary elements method is adopted. Its local form is derived by considering a local domain of each node, comprising by the union of neighboring “background” triangles. Therefore, the boundary shape of this local domain is a polygonal closed line. A combination of interpolation schemes is taken into account. Interpolation of boundary unknown field variables is accomplished through boundary elements’ shape functions. On the other hand, the Radial Basis Point Interpolation Functions method is employed for interpolating the unknown interior fields. Essential boundary conditions are imposed directly due to the Kronecker delta-function property of the boundary elements’ interpolation functions. After the numerical evaluation of all boundary integrals, a banded stiffness matrix is constructed, as in the finite elements method. Several potential and elastostatic benchmark problems in two dimensions are solved numerically. The proposed meshless LBIE method is also compared with other numerical methods, in order to demonstrate its efficiency, accuracy and convergence.     

Dual error indicators for the local boundary integral equation method in 2D potential problems

Three relative error measurements in the numerical solution of potential problems are firstly investigated in detail, and then an algorithm based on the proposed dual error indicators is developed for the meshless local boundary integral equation (LBIE) method. Numerical experiments show that a combined use of the two error indicators is necessary to adequately measure the error of the LBIE solutions.     

A meshless local boundary integral equation (LBIE) method for solving nonlinear problems

A new meshless method for solving nonlinear boundary value problems, based on the local boundary integral equation (LBIE) method and the moving least squares approximation, is proposed in the present paper. The total formulation and a rate formulation are developed for the implementation of the present method. The present method does not need domain and boundary elements to deal with the volume and boundary integrals, which will cause some difficulties for the conventional boundary element method (BEM) or the field/boundary element method (FBEM), as the volume integrals are inevitable in dealing with nonlinear boundary value problems. This is the same for the element free Galerkin (EFG) method which also needs element-like cells in the entire domain to evaluate volume integrals. The “companion fundamental solution” introduced in Zhu, Zhang and Atluri (1998) is used so that no derivatives of the shape functions are needed to construct the stiffness matrix for the interior nodes, as well as for those nodes with no parts of their local boundaries coinciding with the global boundary of the domain of the problem, where essential boundary conditions are specified. It is shown that the satisfaction of the essential as well as natural boundary conditions is quite simple, and algorithmically very efficient, in the present nonlinear LBIE approach. Numerical examples are presented for several problems, for which exact solutions are available. The present method converges fast to the final solution with reasonably accurate results for both the unknown variable and its derivatives. No post processing procedure is required to compute the derivatives of the unknown variable (as in the conventional FBEM), since the solution from the present method, using the moving least squares approximation, is already smooth enough. The numerical results in these examples show that high rates of convergence for the Sobolev norms ∥·∥₀ and ∥·∥₁ are achievable, and that the values of the unknown variable and its derivatives are quite accurate.     

Domain element local integral equation method for potential problems in anisotropic and functionally graded materials

An efficient numerical method is proposed for 2-d potential problems in anisotropic media with continuously variable material coefficients. The method is based on the local integral relationships (integral form of balance equation and/or integral equations utilizing fundamental solutions) and consistent approximation of field variable using standard domain-type elements. The accuracy and convergence of the proposed method is tested by several examples and compared with benchmark analytical solutions.     

Elastodynamic problems by meshless local integral method: Analytical formulation

In this paper, analytical forms of integrals in the meshless local integral equation method in the Laplace space are derived and implemented for elastodynamic problems. The meshless approximation based on the radial basis function (RBF) is employed for implementation of displacements. A weak form of governing equations with a unit test function is transformed into local integral equations. A completed set of the local boundary integrals are obtained in closed form. As the closed form of the local boundary integrals are obtained, there are no domain or boundary integrals to be calculated numerically. Several examples including dynamic fracture mechanics problems are presented to demonstrate the accuracy of the proposed method in comparison with analytical solutions and the boundary element method.     

Boundary integral formulations for three-dimensional anisotropic piezoelectric solids

A boundary integral equation method is applied to the solutions of three dimensional piezoelectric solids. Based on the reciprocal relations, a pair of boundary integral formulae were formulated for evaluation of the fields in the medium. The Green's functions and their first partial derivatives employed in the formulations are evaluated numerically from the line integral solutions derived from the Fourier transform. By constructing some augmented matrices, we show that the topic can be treated systematically as that in the uncoupled elastic and dielectric problems. In illustration, we present results for the internal fields of a spherical cavity in an infinite piezoelectric medium loaded by a uniform traction on its boundary. Two piezoelectric ceramics, PZT-6B and gallium arsenide, are considered in the calculations. Some comparisons are made with solutions of purely elastic solids and with our recent calculations based on the finite element method.This work was supported by the National Science Council, Taiwan, under contract NSC 83-0410-E006-041.     

Analysis of fractures in 3D piezoelectric media by a weakly singular integral equation method

A weakly singular, symmetric Galerkin boundary element method (SGBEM) is established to compute stress and electric intensity factors for isolated cracks in three-dimensional, generally anisotropic, piezoelectric media. The method is based upon a weak-form integral equation, for the surface traction and the surface electric charge, which is established by means of a systematic regularization procedure; the integral equation is in a symmetric form and is completely regularized in the sense that its integrand contains only weakly singular kernels of (hence allowing continuous interpolations to be employed in the numerical approximation). The weakly singular kernels which appear in the weak-form integral equation are expressed explicitly, for general anisotropy, in terms of a line integral over a unit circle. In the numerical implementation, a special crack-tip element is adopted to discretize the region near the crack front while the remainder of the crack surface is discretized by standard continuous elements. The special crack-tip element allows the relative crack-face displacement and electric potential in the vicinity of the crack front to be captured to high accuracy (even with relatively large elements), and it has the important feature that the mixed-mode intensity factors can be directly and independently extracted from the crack front nodal data. To enhance the computational efficiency of the method, special integration quadratures are adopted to treat both singular and nearly singular integrals, and an interpolation strategy is developed to approximate the weakly singular kernels. As demonstrated by various numerical examples for both planar and non-planar fractures, the method gives rise to highly accurate intensity factors with only a weak dependence on mesh refinement.     

An improved boundary integral equation method for Helmholtz problems

The eigenvalue problem for the Laplace operator is numerical investigated using the boundary integral equation (BIE) formulation. Three methods of discretization are given and illustrated with numerical examples.     

An integral equation method for dynamic crack growth problems

Within the assumptions of linear elastic fracture mechanics, dynamic stresses generated by a crack growth event are examined for the case of an infinite body in the state of plane strain subjected to mode I loading.The method of analysis developed in this paper is based on an integral equation in one spatial coordinate and in time. The kernel of this equation, i.e., the influence or Green's function, is the response of an elastic half-space to a concentrated unit impulse acting on its edge. The unknown function is the normal stress distribution in the plane of the crack, while the free term represents the effect of external loading.The solution for the stresses is obtained with the assumption that its spatial distribution contains a square root singularity near the tip of the crack, while its intensity is an unknown function of time. Thus, the orginal integral equation in space and time reduces to Volterra's integral equation of the first kind in time. The equation is singular, with the singularity of the kernel being a combined effect of the singularity of the influence function and the singularity of the dynamic stresses at the tip of the crack. Its solution is obtained numerically with the aid of a combination of quadrature and product integration methods. The case of a semi-infinite crack moving with a prescribed velocity is examined in detail.The method can be readily extended to problems involving mode II and mixed mode crack propagation as well as to problems of dynamic external loadings.     

Evaluation of fracture parameters in continuously nonhomogeneous piezoelectric solids

A contour integral method is developed for computation of stress intensity and electric intensity factors for cracks in continuously nonhomogeneous piezoelectric body under a transient dynamic load. It is shown that the asymptotic fields in the crack-tip vicinity in a continuously nonhomogeneos medium is the same as in a homogeneous one. A meshless method based on the local Petrov-Galerkin approach is applied for computation of physical fields occurring in the contour integral expressions of intensity factors. A unit step function is used as the test functions in the local weak-form. This leads to local integral equations (LBIEs) involving only contour-integrals on the surfaces of subdomains. The moving least-squares (MLS) method is adopted for approximating the physical quantities in the LBIEs. The accuracy of the present method for computing the stress intensity factors (SIF) and electrical displacement intensity factors (EDIF) are discussed by comparison with available analytical or numerical solutions.     

Boundary integral equation method for elastic beams in frictionless contact problems

A boundary integral equation algorithm for the contact analysis of elastic beams is presented in this paper. The analysis of this sort is complicated by the unknown and moving boundary points. The new algorithm incorporates the interface compatibility equation, derived from the principle of minimum potential energy, into the general boundary integral equation so that the locations of boundary points may be correctly identified. The incremental and iterative solution procedure is presented. Accuracy and efficiency of the new algorithm are demonstrated using examples whose classical solutions exists.     

A regularized boundary integral equation method for elastodynamic crack problems

This paper presents a double layer potential approach of elastodynamic BIE crack analysis. Our method regularizes the conventional strongly singular expressions for the traction of double layer potential into forms including integrable kernels and 0th, 1st and 2nd order derivatives of the double layer density. The manipulation is systematized by the use of the stress function representation of the differentiated double layer kernel functions. This regularization, together with the use of B-spline functions, is shown to provide accurate numerical methods of crack analysis in 3D time harmonic elastodynamics.     

Exterior stable domain segmentation integral equation method for scattering problems

This paper is concerned with the development of an exterior domain segmentation method for the solution of two- or three-dimensional time-harmonic scattering problems in acoustic media. This method, based on a variational localized, symmetric, boundary integral equation formulation leads, upon discretization, to a sparse system of algebraic equations whose solution requires only O(N) multiplications, where N is the number of unknown nodal pressures on the scatterer surface. The new procedure is analogous to the one developed recently¹ except that in the present formulation we avoid completely the use of the hypersingular operator, thereby reducing the computational complexity. Numerical experiments for a rigid circular cylindrical scatterer subjected to a plane incident wave serve to assess its accuracy for normalized wave numbers, ka, ranging from 0 to 30, both directly on the scatterer and in the far field, and to confirm that, contrary to standard boundary integral equation formulations, the present procedure is valid for critical frequencies.     

An equivalent domain integral method for three-dimensional mixed-mode fracture problems

A general formulation of the equivalent domain integral (EDI) method for mixed-mode fracture problems in cracked solids is presented. The method is discussed in the context of a 3-D finite-element analysis. The J-integral consists of two parts: the volume integral of the crack front potential over a torus enclosing the crack front and the crack surface integral due to the crack front potential plus the crack-face loading. In mixed-mode crack problems the total J-integral is split into J_I, J_II, and J_III, representing the severity of the crack front in three modes of deformation. The direct and decomposition methods are used to separate the modes. These two methods were applied to several mixed-mode fracture problems in isotropic materials. Several pure and mixed-mode fracture problems were analyzed and results found to agree well with those available in the literature. The method lends itself to be used as a post-processing subroutine in a general purpose finite-element program.     

Local integral equation method for potential problems in functionally graded anisotropic materials

Efficient computational techniques are developed for 2D potential problems in anisotropic media with continuously variable material coefficients. The method is based on integral relationships considered on local sub-domains and domain-type approximations of the field variable. Three different kinds of integral equations are combined with either a domain element interpolation or a meshless point interpolation. The physical background of the formulation is discussed briefly. The accuracy and the convergence of the proposed techniques are tested by several examples and compared with benchmark analytical solutions.     

Transient heat conduction analysis in functionally graded materials by the meshless local boundary integral equation method

Advanced computational method for transient heat conduction analysis in continuously nonhomogeneous functionally graded materials (FGM) is proposed. The method is based on the local boundary integral equations with moving least square approximation of the temperature and heat flux. The initial-boundary value problem is solved by the Laplace transform technique. Both Papoulis and Stehfest algorithms are applied for the numerical Laplace inversion to obtain the time-dependent solutions. Numerical results are presented for a finite strip and a hollow cylinder with an exponential spatial variation of material parameters.     

Boundary integral equation method for linear porous-elasticity with applications to fracture propagation

For the semi-infinite crack propagating quasi-statically in a porous-elastic medium, the boundary integral equation method (BIEM), based on a reciprocal principle, is formulated for the governing equations of the Biot model of linear porous-elasticity. The resulting numerical scheme is efficient since the discretization of the solution unknowns is required only along the axis of symmetry of a fracture. Fracture propagation criteria based on both elastic and plastic constitutive relations are investigated. Practical applications of the model are expected in the failure of overconsolidated clay, earthquake prediction and underground hydraulic fracturing for energy exploration.