Parallel finite element analysis

• Main Author: Margetts, Lee
• Published: University of Manchester 2002
• Subjects: 620.001; Finite element analysis : High performance computing : Magnetohydrodynamics
• Online Access: http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.521357

Finite element analysis is versatile and used widely in a range of engineering andscientific disciplines. As time passes, the problems that engineers and designers areexpected to solve are becoming more computationally demanding. Often theproblems involve the interplay of two or more processes which are physically andtherefore mathematically coupled. Although parallel computers have been availablefor about twenty years to satisfy this demand, finite element analysis is still largelyexecuted on serial machines. Parallelisation appears to be difficult, even for thespecialist. Parallel machines, programming languages, libraries and tools are used toparallelise old serial programs with mixed success. In some cases the serialalgorithm is not naturally suitable for parallel computing. Some argue that rewritingthe programs from scratch, using an entirely different solution strategy is a betterapproach. Taking this point of view, using MPI for portability, a mesh free elementby element method for simple data distribution and the appropriate iterative solvers,a general parallel strategy for finite element analysis is developed and assessed.