A hybrid variational-collocation immersed method for fluid-structure interaction using unstructured T-splines

Abstract

Summary We present a hybrid variational-collocation, immersed, and fully-implicit formulation for fluid-structure interaction (FSI) using unstructured T-splines. In our immersed methodology, we define an Eulerian mesh on the whole computational domain and a Lagrangian mesh on the solid domain, which moves arbitrarily on top of the Eulerian mesh. Mathematically, the problem reduces to solving three equations, namely, the linear momentum balance, mass conservation, and a condition of kinematic compatibility between the Lagrangian displacement and the Eulerian velocity. We use a weighted residual approach for the linear momentum and mass conservation equations, but we discretize directly the strong form of the kinematic relation, deriving a hybrid variational-collocation method. We use T-splines for both the spatial discretization and the information transfer between the Eulerian mesh and the Lagrangian mesh. T-splines offer us two main advantages against non-uniform rational B-splines: they can be locally refined and they are unstructured. The generalized-α method is used for the time discretization. We validate our formulation with a common FSI benchmark problem achieving excellent agreement with the theoretical solution. An example involving a partially immersed solid is also solved. The numerical examples show how the use of T-junctions and extraordinary nodes results in an accurate, efficient, and flexible method. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.