Discretization of the Convection-Diffusion Equation Using Discrete Exterior Calculus

A discretization of the Convection-Diffusion equation is developed based on Discrete Exterior Calculus (DEC). While DEC discretization of the diffusive term in the equation is well understood, the convective part (with non-constant convective flow) had not been DEC discretized. In this study, we develop such discretization of the convective term using geometric arguments. We can discretize the convective term for both compressible and incompressible flow. Moreover, since the Finite Element Method with linear interpolation functions (FEML) and DEC local matrix formulations are similar, this numerical scheme is well suited for parallel computing. Using this feature, numerical tests are carried out on simple domains with coarse and fine meshes to compare DEC and FEML and show numerical convergence for stationary problems.