Daniele Di Pietro

Florent Chave, Daniele Di Pietro, Luca Formaggia

We develop a novel Hybrid High-Order method for the simulation of Darcy flows in fractured porous media. The discretization hinges on a mixed formulation in the bulk region and on a primal formulation inside the fracture. Salient features of the method include a seamless treatment of nonconforming discretizations of the fracture, as well as the support of arbitrary approximation orders on fairly general meshes. For the version of the method corresponding to a polynomial degree k ě 0, we prove convergence in h^{k+1} of the discretization error measured in an energy-like norm. In the error estimate, we explicitly track the dependence of the constants on the problem data, showing that the method is fully robust with respect to the heterogeneity of the permeability coefficients, and it exhibits only a mild dependence on the square root of the local anisotropy of the bulk permeability. The numerical validation on a comprehensive set of test cases confirms the theoretical results.

Daniele Di Pietro, Jerome Droniou

In this work we prove optimal $W^{s,p}$-approximation estimates (with $p\in[1,+\infty]$) for elliptic projectors on local polynomial spaces. The proof hinges on the classical Dupont--Scott approximation theory together with two novel abstract lemmas: An approximation result for bounded projectors, and an $L^p$-boundedness result for $L^2$-orthogonal projectors on polynomial subspaces. The $W^{s,p}$-approximation results have general applicability to (standard or polytopal) numerical methods based on local polynomial spaces. As an illustration, we use these $W^{s,p}$-estimates to derive novel error estimates for a Hybrid High-Order discretization of Leray--Lions elliptic problems whose weak formulation is classically set in $W^{1,p}(Ω)$ for some $p\in(1,+\infty)$. This kind of problems appears, e.g., in the modelling of glacier motion, of incompressible turbulent flows, and in airfoil design. Denoting by $h$ the meshsize, we prove that the approximation error measured in a $W^{1,p}$-like discrete norm scales as $h^{\frac{k+1}{p-1}}$ when $p\ge 2$ and as $h^{(k+1)(p-1)}$ when $p<2$.

Florent Chave, Daniele Di Pietro, Fabien Marche

We propose a novel Hybrid High-Order method for the Cahn-Hilliard problem with convection. The proposed method is valid in two and three space dimensions, and it supports arbitrary approximation orders on general meshes containing polyhedral elements and nonmatching interfaces. An extensive numerical validation is presented, which shows robustness with respect to the Péclet number.

Lorenzo Botti, Daniele Di Pietro, Jérôme Droniou

In this work we propose a novel Hybrid High-Order method for the incompressible Navier--Stokes equations based on a formulation of the convective term including Temam's device for stability. The proposed method has several advantageous features: it supports arbitrary approximation orders on general meshes including polyhedral elements and non-matching interfaces; it is inf-sup stable; it is locally conservative; it supports both the weak and strong enforcement of velocity boundary conditions; it is amenable to efficient computer implementations where a large subset of the unknowns is eliminated by solving local problems inside each element. Particular care is devoted to the design of the convective trilinear form, which mimicks at the discrete level the non-dissipation property of the continuous one. The possibility to add a convective stabilisation term is also contemplated, and a formulation covering various classical options is discussed. The proposed method is theoretically analysed, and an energy error estimate in $h^{k+1}$ (with $h$ denoting the meshsize) is proved under the usual data smallness assumption. A thorough numerical validation on two and three-dimensional test cases is provided both to confirm the theoretical convergence rates and to assess the method in more physical configurations (including, in particular, the well-known two- and three-dimensional lid-driven cavity problems).

Michele Botti, Daniele Di Pietro, Pierre Sochala

In this work we propose and analyze a novel Hybrid High-Order discretization of a class of (linear and) nonlinear elasticity models in the small deformation regime which are of common use in solid mechanics. The proposed method is valid in two and three space dimensions, it supports general meshes including polyhedral elements and nonmatching interfaces, enables arbitrary approximation order, and the resolution cost can be reduced by statically condensing a large subset of the unknowns for linearized versions of the problem. Additionally, the method satisfies a local principle of virtual work inside each mesh element, with interface tractions that obey the law of action and reaction. A complete analysis covering very general stress-strain laws is carried out, and optimal error estimates are proved. Extensive numerical validation on model test problems is also provided on two types of nonlinear models.

Daniele Boffi, Daniele Di Pietro

We propose in this work a unified formulation of mixed and primal discretization methods on polyhedral meshes hinging on globally coupled degrees of freedom that are discontinuous polynomials on the mesh skeleton. To emphasize this feature, these methods are referred to here as discontinuous skeletal. As a starting point, we define two families of discretizations corresponding, respectively, to mixed and primal formulations of discontinuous skeletal methods. Each family is uniquely identified by prescribing three polynomial degrees defining the degrees of freedom and a stabilization bilinear form which has to satisfy two properties of simple verification: stability and polynomial consistency. Several examples of methods available in the recent literature are shown to belong to either one of those families. We then prove new equivalence results that build a bridge between the two families of methods. Precisely, we show that for any mixed method there exists a corresponding equivalent primal method, and the converse is true provided that the gradients are approximated in suitable spaces. A unified convergence analysis is also carried out delivering optimal error estimates in both energy- and $L^2$-norms.