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Comparison of finite difference‐ and pseudospectral methods for convective flow over a sphere
Author(s) -
Fornberg Bengt,
Merrill David
Publication year - 1997
Publication title -
geophysical research letters
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.007
H-Index - 273
eISSN - 1944-8007
pISSN - 0094-8276
DOI - 10.1029/97gl03272
Subject(s) - spherical harmonics , pseudospectral optimal control , finite difference , pseudo spectral method , spherical shell , convection , longitude , finite difference method , grid , physics , fourier transform , convective flow , finite element method , flow (mathematics) , gauss pseudospectral method , harmonics , mechanics , mathematical analysis , shell (structure) , computational physics , mathematics , latitude , fourier analysis , geometry , materials science , composite material , thermodynamics , astronomy , voltage , quantum mechanics
For modeling convective flows over a sphere or within a spherical shell, pseudospectral (PS) methods are in general far more cost‐effective than finite difference‐ (or finite element) methods. This study confirms this, and proceeds by comparing a Fourier‐PS implementation (based on a longitude‐latitude grid) with one using spherical harmonics. For similar resolutions, these are found to be of similar accuracy. However, the former is computationally about ten times faster.