A flux preserving immersed nonconforming finite element method for elliptic problems

Abstract

An immersed nonconforming finite element method based on the flux continuity on intercell boundaries is introduced. The direct application of flux continuity across the support of basis functions yields a nonsymmetric stiffness system for interface elements. To overcome non-symmetry of the stiffness system we introduce a modification based on the Riesz representation and a local postprocessing to recover local fluxes. This approach yields a immersed nonconforming finite element method with a slightly different source term from the standard nonconforming finite element method. The recovered numerical flux conserves total flux in arbitrary sub-domain. An optimal rate of convergence in the energy norm is obtained and numerical examples are provided to confirm our analysis. © 2014 Published by Elsevier B.V. onbehalf of IMACS.