Project Details
Projekt
Kinetic Algorithms for the Maxwell-Boltzmann System and the Simulation of Magnetospheric Propulsion Systems
Subject Area
Fluid Mechanics
Term
from 2012 to 2020
Project identifier
Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 215420141
The goal of this research project is the further development of the combined Particle-in-Cell Direct Simulation Monte Carlo solver "PICLas", which is designed for the simulation of rarefied, reactive plasma flows. These flows are characterized by strong, local gradients in density and Debye length. The goal of this proposal is to further improve the methods required to efficiently simulate demanding cases, like the charging of satellites or a magnetospheric solar sail. In the previous funding, following methods have been developed to achieve an efficient scheme: the implicit handling of the Maxwell solver, a statistical "Split & Merge" algorithm which allows to use a dynamic particle weight and a new local "Octree - Nearest Neighbor Search" algorithm. These techniques enabled the first successful simulations of a part of magnetospheric sail. In the second project period, the numerical scheme is further improved to match the encountered physical scales. To surpass the restrictions of the explicit particle pushing encountered in the previous proposal, the time integration of fast particles may also be handled implicitly. The variable particle weight will be extended to chemical reactions and relaxation processes occurring in the DSMC module. Furthermore, the relaxation model of internal degrees of freedom will be exchanged for a sophisticated model, which considers the concurrent, internal particle state. Finally, the handling of non-conforming meshes will be implemented in the PIC method. This step is necessary to resolve large spatial gradients in the Debye-length, allowing to split cells in denser regions.
DFG Programme
Research Grants
