Ilaria Perugia

Paola F. Antonietti, Mattia Corti, Sergio Gómez et al.

We investigate a two-state conformational conversion system and introduce a novel structure-preserving numerical scheme that couples a local discontinuous Galerkin space discretization with the backward Euler time-integration method. The model is first reformulated in terms of auxiliary variables involving suitable nonlinear transformations, which allow us to enforce positivity and boundedness at the numerical level. Then, we prove a discrete entropy-stability inequality, which we use to show the existence of discrete solutions, as well as to establish the convergence of the scheme by means of some discrete compactness arguments. As a by-product of the theoretical analysis, we also prove the existence of global weak solutions satisfying the system's physical bounds. Numerical results validate the theoretical results and assess the capabilities of the proposed method in practice.

Fritz Kretzschmar, Andrea Moiola, Ilaria Perugia et al.

We present and analyse a space-time discontinuous Galerkin method for wave propagation problems. The special feature of the scheme is that it is a Trefftz method, namely that trial and test functions are solution of the partial differential equation to be discretised in each element of the (space-time) mesh. The method considered is a modification of the discontinuous Galerkin schemes of Kretzschmar et al., and of Monk and Richter. For Maxwell's equations in one space dimension, we prove stability of the method, quasi-optimality, best approximation estimates for polynomial Trefftz spaces and (fully explicit) error bounds with high order in the meshwidth and in the polynomial degree. The analysis framework also applies to scalar wave problems and Maxwell's equations in higher space dimensions. Some numerical experiments demonstrate the theoretical results proved and the faster convergence compared to the non-Trefftz version of the scheme.

Lorenzo Mascotto, Ilaria Perugia, Alexander Pichler

We study the $h$- and $p$-versions of non-conforming harmonic virtual element methods (VEM) for the approximation of the Dirichlet-Laplace problem on a 2D polygonal domain, providing quasi-optimal error bounds. Harmonic VEM do not make use of internal degrees of freedom. This leads to a faster convergence, in terms of the number of degrees of freedom, as compared to standard VEM. Importantly, the technical tools used in our $p$-analysis can be employed as well in the analysis of more general non-conforming finite element methods and VEM. The theoretical results are validated in a series of numerical experiments. The $hp$-version of the method is numerically tested, demonstrating exponential convergence with rate given by the square root of the number of degrees of freedom.

Francesca Bonizzoni, Marcel Braukhoff, Ansgar Jüngel et al.

An implicit Euler discontinuous Galerkin scheme for the Fisher-Kolmogorov-Petrovsky-Piscounov (Fisher-KPP) equation for population densities with no-flux boundary conditions is suggested and analyzed. Using an exponential variable transformation, the numerical scheme automatically preserves the positivity of the discrete solution. A discrete entropy inequality is derived, and the exponential time decay of the discrete density to the stable steady state in the L1 norm is proved if the initial entropy is smaller than the measure of the domain. The discrete solution is proved to converge in the L2 norm to the unique strong solution to the time-discrete Fisher-KPP equation as the mesh size tends to zero. Numerical experiments in one space dimension illustrate the theoretical results.

Francesca Bonizzoni, Fabio Nobile, Ilaria Perugia et al.

The present work deals with the rational model order reduction method based on the single-point Least-Square (LS) Padé approximation technique introduced in [3]. Algorithmical aspects concerning the construction of the rational LS-Padé approximant are described. In particular, the computation of the Padé denominator is reduced to the calculation of the eigenvector corresponding to the minimal eigenvalue of a Gramian matrix. The LS-Padé technique is employed to approximate the frequency response map associated to various parametric time-harmonic wave problems, namely, a transmission/reflection problem, a scattering problem and a problem in high-frequency regime. In all cases we establish the meromorphy of the frequency response map. The Helmholtz equation with stochastic wavenumber is also considered. In particular, for Lipschitz functionals of the solution, and their corresponding probability measures, we establish weak convergence of the measure derived from the LS-Padé approximant to the true one. 2D numerical tests are performed, which confirm the effectiveness of the approximation method.

Scott Congreve, Paul Houston, Ilaria Perugia

In this article we develop an $hp$-adaptive refinement procedure for Trefftz discontinuous Galerkin methods applied to the homogeneous Helmholtz problem. Our approach combines not only mesh subdivision (h-refinement) and local basis enrichment (p-refinement), but also incorporates local directional adaptivity, whereby the elementwise plane wave basis is aligned with the dominant scattering direction. Numerical experiments based on employing an empirical a posteriori error indicator clearly highlight the efficiency of the proposed approach for various examples.

Scott Congreve, Joscha Gedicke, Ilaria Perugia

We present a numerical study to investigate the conditioning of the plane wave discontinuous Galerkin discretization of the Helmholtz problem. We provide empirical evidence that the spectral condition number of the plane wave basis on a single element depends algebraically on the mesh size and the wave number, and exponentially on the number of plane wave directions; we also test its dependence on the element shape. We show that the conditioning of the global system can be improved by orthogonalization of the local basis functions with the modified Gram-Schmidt algorithm, which results in significantly fewer GMRES iterations for solving the discrete problem iteratively.

Scott Congreve, Joscha Gedicke, Ilaria Perugia

This paper presents an $hp$ a posteriori error analysis for the 2D Helmholtz equation that is robust in the polynomial degree $p$ and the wave number $k$. For the discretization, we consider a discontinuous Galerkin formulation that is unconditionally well posed. The a posteriori error analysis is based on the technique of equilibrated fluxes applied to a shifted Poisson problem, with the error due to the nonconformity of the discretization controlled by a potential reconstruction. We prove that the error estimator is both reliable and efficient, under the condition that the initial mesh size and polynomial degree is chosen such that the discontinuous Galerkin formulation converges, i.e., it is out of the regime of pollution. We confirm the efficiency of an $hp$-adaptive refinement strategy based on the presented robust a posteriori error estimator via several numerical examples.

Paola F. Antonietti, Francesca Bonizzoni, Ilaria Perugia et al.

We introduce a Monte Carlo Virtual Element estimator based on Virtual Element discretizations for stochastic elliptic partial differential equations with random diffusion coefficients. We prove estimates for the statistical approximation error for both the solution and suitable linear quantities of interest. A Multilevel Monte Carlo Virtual Element method is also developed and analyzed to mitigate the computational cost of the plain Monte Carlo strategy. The proposed approach exploits the flexibility of the Virtual Element method on general polytopal meshes and employs sequences of coarser spaces constructed via mesh agglomeration, providing a practical realization of the multilevel hierarchy even in complex geometries. This strategy substantially reduces the number of samples required on the finest level to achieve a prescribed accuracy. We prove convergence of the multilevel method and analyze its computational complexity, showing that it yields significant cost reductions compared to standard Monte Carlo methods for a prescribed accuracy. Extensive numerical experiments support the theoretical results and demonstrate the efficiency of the proposed method.

Lourenço Beirão da Veiga, Sergio Gómez, Ilaria Perugia et al.

We propose and analyze a class of finite element methods for the time-dependent incompressible magnetohydrodynamics system based on $H(\mathrm{curl})$-conforming discretizations for both the velocity and the magnetic field. This choice is guided by the aim of developing methods that are also suitable for the types of solutions arising in problems posed on nonconvex domains. Within this framework, we introduce three stabilized formulations, and study how the stabilization mechanisms employed influence their structural properties. In particular, we focus on suitability for nonconvex polyhedral domains, the need for Lagrange multipliers for the magnetic field, pressure-robustness, and quasi-robustness with respect to both the fluid and magnetic Reynolds numbers. The proposed formulations are further assessed through numerical experiments, highlighting their practical performance.

Andrea Moiola, Ilaria Perugia

We introduce a space-time Trefftz discontinuous Galerkin method for the first-order transient acoustic wave equations in arbitrary space dimensions, extending the one dimensional scheme of Kretzschmar et al. (2016, IMA J. Numer. Anal., 36, 1599-1635). Test and trial discrete functions are space-time piecewise polynomial solutions of the wave equations. We prove well-posedness and a priori error bounds in both skeleton-based and mesh-independent norms. The space-time formulation corresponds to an implicit time-stepping scheme, if posed on meshes partitioned in time slabs, or to an explicit scheme, if posed on "tent-pitched" meshes. We describe two Trefftz polynomial discrete spaces, introduce bases for them and prove optimal, high-order $h$-convergence bounds.

Ralf Hiptmair, Andrea Moiola, Ilaria Perugia

Trefftz methods are finite element-type schemes whose test and trial functions are (locally) solutions of the targeted differential equation. They are particularly popular for time-harmonic wave problems, as their trial spaces contain oscillating basis functions and may achieve better approximation properties than classical piecewise-polynomial spaces. We review the construction and properties of several Trefftz variational formulations developed for the Helmholtz equation, including least squares, discontinuous Galerkin, ultra weak variational formulation, variational theory of complex rays and wave based methods. The most common discrete Trefftz spaces used for this equation employ generalised harmonic polynomials (circular and spherical waves), plane and evanescent waves, fundamental solutions and multipoles as basis functions; we describe theoretical and computational aspects of these spaces, focusing in particular on their approximation properties. One of the most promising, but not yet well developed, features of Trefftz methods is the use of adaptivity in the choice of the propagation directions for the basis functions. The main difficulties encountered in the implementation are the assembly and the ill-conditioning of linear systems, we briefly survey some strategies that have been proposed to cope with these problems.

Ilaria Perugia, Paola Pietra, Alessandro Russo

We introduce and analyze a virtual element method (VEM) for the Helmholtz problem with approximating spaces made of products of low order VEM functions and plane waves. We restrict ourselves to the 2D Helmholtz equation with impedance boundary conditions on the whole domain boundary. The main ingredients of the plane wave VEM scheme are: i) a low frequency space made of VEM functions, whose basis functions are not explicitly computed in the element interiors; ii) a proper local projection operator onto the high-frequency space, made of plane waves; iii) an approximate stabilization term. A convergence result for the h-version of the method is proved, and numerical results testing its performance on general polygonal meshes are presented.