Simulating the kinematics of completely faceted surfaces

Norris, S.A. and Watson, S.J. (2012) Simulating the kinematics of completely faceted surfaces. Journal of Computational Physics, 231(14), pp. 4560-4577. (doi: 10.1016/j.jcp.2012.02.030)

Abstract

We fully generalize a previously-developed computational geometry tool [1] to perform large-scale simulations of arbitrary two-dimensional faceted surfaces $z = h(x,y)$. Our method uses a three-component facet/edge/junction storage model, which by naturally mirroring the intrinsic surface structure allows both rapid simulation and easy extraction of geometrical statistics. The bulk of this paper is a comprehensive treatment of topological events, which are detected and performed explicitly. In addition, we also give a careful analysis of the subtle pitfalls associated with time-stepping schemes for systems with topological changes. The method is demonstrated using a simple facet dynamics on surfaces with three different symmetries. Appendices detail the reconnection of "holes" left by facet removal and a strategy for dealing with the inherent kinematic non-uniqueness displayed by several topological events.

• Item Type: Articles
• Status: Published
• Refereed: Yes
• Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID: Watson, Dr Stephen
• Authors: Norris, S.A., and Watson, S.J.
• Subjects: Q Science > QA Mathematics
• College/School: College of Science and Engineering > School of Mathematics and Statistics > Mathematics
• Journal Name: Journal of Computational Physics
• ISSN: 0021-9991

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