Solutions to conservation laws satisfy the monotonicity property: the number of local extrema is a non-increasing function of time, and local maximum/minimum values decrease/increase monotonically in time. This paper investigates this property from a numerical standpoint. We introduce a class of fully discrete in space and time, high order accurate, difference schemes, called generalized monotone schemes. Convergence toward the entropy solution is proven via a new technique of proof, assuming that the initial data has a finite number of extremum values only, and the flux-function is strictly convex. We define discrete paths of extrema by tracking local extremum values in the approximate solution. In the course of the analysis we establish the pointwise convergence of the trace of the solution along a path of extremum. As a corollary, we obtain a proof of convergence for a MUSCL-type scheme being second order accurate away from sonic points and extrema.

For numerical simulation of detonation, computational cost using uniform meshes is large due to the vast separation in both time and space scales. Adaptive mesh refinement (AMR) is advantageous for problems with vastly different scales. This paper aims to propose an AMR method with high order accuracy for numerical investigation of multi-dimensional detonation. A well-designed AMR method based on finite difference weighted essentially non-oscillatory (WENO) scheme, named as AMR\&WENO is proposed. A new cell-based data structure is used to organize the adaptive meshes. The new data structure makes it possible for cells to communicate with each other quickly and easily. In order to develop an AMR method with high order accuracy, high order prolongations in both space and time are utilized in the data prolongation procedure. Based on the message passing interface (MPI) platform, we have developed a workload balancing parallel AMR\&WENO code using the Hilbert space-filling curve algorithm. Our numerical experiments with detonation simulations indicate that the AMR\&WENO is accurate and have a high resolution. Moreover, we evaluate and compare the performance between the uniform mesh WENO scheme and the parallel AMR\&WENO method. The comparison results provide us further insight into the high performance of the parallel AMR\&WENO method.

In this paper, we develop a nodal discontinuous Galerkin method for solving the time-dependent Maxwell’s equations when metamaterials are involved. Both semi- and fully-discrete schemes are constructed. Numerical stability and error estimate are proved for both schemes. Numerical results are presented to demonstrate that the method is not only efficient but also very effective in solving metamaterial Maxwell’s equatons.

A new high order finite-difference method utilizing the idea of Harten ENO subcell resolution method is proposed for chemical reactive flows and combustion. In reaction problems, when the reaction time scale is very small, e.g., orders of magnitude smaller than the fluid dynamics time scales, the governing equations will become very stiff. Wrong propagation speed of discontinuity may occur due to the underresolved numerical solution in both space and time. The present proposed method is a modified fractional step method which solves the convection step and reaction step separately. In the convection step, any high order shock-capturing method can be used. In the reaction step, an ODE solver is applied but with the computed flow variables in the shock region modified by the Harten subcell resolution idea. For numerical experiments, a fifth-order finite-difference WENO scheme and its anti-diffusion WENO variant are considered. A wide range of 1D and 2D scalar and Euler system test cases are investigated. Studies indicate that for the considered test cases, the new method maintains high order accuracy in space for smooth flows, and for stiff source terms with discontinuities, it can capture the correct propagation speed of discontinuities in very coarse meshes with reasonable CFL numbers.

Consider the problem of reconstructing unknown Robin inclusions inside a heat conductor from boundary measurements. This problem arises from active thermography and is formulated as an inverse boundary value problem for the heat equation. In our previous works, we proposed a sampling-type method for reconstructing the boundary of the Robin inclusion and gave its rigorous mathematical justification. This method is non-iterative and based on the characterization of the solution to the so-called Neumann-to-Dirichlet map gap equation. In this paper, we give a further investigation of the reconstruction method from both the theoretical and numerical points of view. First, we clarify the solvability of the Neumann-to-Dirichlet map gap equation and establish a relation of its solution to the Green function associated with an initial-boundary value problem for the heat equation inside the Robin inclusion. This naturally provides a way of computing this Green function from the Neumann-to-Dirichlet map and explains what is the input for the linear sampling method. Assuming that the Neumann-to-Dirichlet map gap equation has a unique solution, we also show the convergence of our method for noisy measurements. Second, we give the numerical implementation of the reconstruction method for two-dimensional spatial domains. The measurements for our inverse problem are simulated by solving the forward problem via the boundary integral equation method. Numerical results are presented to illustrate the efficiency and stability of the proposed method. By using a finite sequence of transient input over a time interval, we propose a new sampling method over the time interval by single measurement which is most likely to be practical.