A variable time-step IMEX-BDF2 SAV scheme and its sharp error estimate for the Navier–Stokes equations

Abstract

We generalize the implicit-explicit (IMEX) second-order backward difference (BDF2) scalar auxiliary variable (SAV) scheme for Navier–Stokes equation with periodic boundary conditions (Huang and Shen, SIAM J. Numer. Anal. 59 (2021) 2926–2954) to a variable time-step IMEX-BDF2 SAV scheme, and carry out a rigorous stability and convergence analysis. The key ingredients of our analysis are a new modified discrete Grönwall inequality, exploration of the discrete orthogonal convolution (DOC) kernels, and the unconditional stability of the proposed scheme. We derive global and local optimal H1 error estimates in 2D and 3D, respectively. Our analysis provides a theoretical support for solving Navier–Stokes equations using variable time-step IMEX-BDF2 SAV schemes. We also design an adaptive time-stepping strategy, and provide ample numerical examples to confirm the effectiveness and efficiency of our proposed methods.