2016 - Fast FMBEM For 3D Acoustics

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL FOR NUMERICAL METHODS IN ENGINEERING
Int. J. Numer. Meth. Engng 2017; 110:842–861

Published online 23 November 2016 in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com). DOI: 10.1002/nme.5434
hp Fast multipole boundary element method for 3D acoustics
Sören Keuchel*,† , Kerstin Vater and Otto von Estorff

Institute of Modelling and Computation, Hamburg University of Technology, Denickestraße 17,
D-21073 Hamburg, Germany
SUMMARY
A fast multipole boundary element method (FMBEM) extended by an adaptive mesh refinement algorithm
for solving acoustic problems in three-dimensional space is presented in this paper. The Collocation method
is used, and the Burton–Miller formulation is employed to overcome the fictitious eigenfrequencies arising
for exterior domain problems. Because of the application of the combined integral equation, the developed
FMBEM is feasible for all positive wave numbers even up to high frequencies. In order to evaluate the
hypersingular integral resulting from the Burton–Miller formulation of the boundary integral equation, an
integration technique for arbitrary element order is applied. The fast multipole method combined with an
arbitrary order h-p mesh refinement strategy enables accurate computation of large-scale systems. Numerical
examples substantiate the high accuracy attainable by the developed FMBEM, while requiring only moderate
computational effort at the same time. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Received 17 April 2015; Revised 24 August 2016; Accepted 17 September 2016
KEY WORDS: adaptive mesh refinement; arbitrary element order; fast multipole method; boundary element
method; Burton–Miller formulation; Helmholtz equation
1. INTRODUCTION
In addition to FEM, the BEM has become one of the most popular approaches for solving acous-
tic problems. Especially, exterior (infinite) sound radiation problems benefit from the advantages of
the BEM compared with the FEM by reason of discretizing only the boundary instead of the whole
infinite calculation domain. Moreover, the Sommerfeld radiation condition is always satisfied, pro-
vided that the element outward normals point away from the calculation domain [1]. Even though
the dimension of the problem is reduced by one, the system matrices are in general fully populated,
non-symmetric, and hold complex entries. On this account, iterative solvers like the generalized
minimal residual method [2] are applied, which are based on frequent matrix vector multiplication.
In order to reduce the computational effort, the fast multipole method (FMM) is considered as a
promising technique. In 1985, Rokhlin [3] introduced the FMM for analyzing potential problems
of large-scale particle systems. A diagonal form for high frequency acoustic problems in three-
dimensional space has been developed later on [4]. The FMM makes use of hierarchical structures
between the collocation points, as presented in [5, 6], or [7]. The influence of nodes in some distance
of the considered field point is computed only approximately, while nearby source points are evalu-
ated directly. In this manner, the CPU time and memory requirement for setting up and solving the
system of equations by means of an iterative solver is reduced to a quasi-linear dependency on the
number of degrees of freedom. Thus, the application of the BEM to large-scale systems is enabled.
In addition to this, the FMM can also be used as a preconditioner for the FEM [8]. The efficient far
field approximation of the FMM speeds up wave-dependent problems discretized for the FEM.
*Correspondence to: Sören Keuchel, Institute of Modelling and Computation, Hamburg University of Technology,
Denickestraße 17, D-21073 Hamburg, Germany.
† E-mail: soeren.keuchel@tuhh.de
Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

HP FAST MULTIPOLE BOUNDARY ELEMENT METHOD FOR 3D ACOUSTICS 843
The non-uniqueness problem arising for exterior problems poses another drawback of the BEM.
The conventional boundary integral equation (CBIE) does not hold a unique solution for certain
wave numbers related to the eigenfrequencies of the corresponding interior problem. In order to
overcome these critical frequencies, Burton and Miller [9] developed a combined conventional and
hypersingular boundary integral equation (HBIE) formulation. Both CBIE and HBIE describe the
acoustic conditions on the boundary, but for every frequency, they only have one solution in com-
mon. Thus, a linear combination of these integral equations yields a unique solution for all positive
wave numbers [10], and the BEM becomes feasible even for high frequency ranges. Nevertheless,
the Burton–Miller formulation suffers from the hypersingular kernel enclosed by the HBIE. Inte-
gration techniques for hypersingular functions have been subject of research for a long time. An
approach applicable for arbitrary element orders consists of the singularity subtraction technique
[11, 12], which regularizes the hypersingular integral to a formulation containing at least weakly
singular kernels. Another suitable algorithm is based on a subtraction of a series expansion [13],
which is applicable within the presented framework, as well.
In addition to the computational effort required by a BEM program, the accuracy achieved by
the boundary integral calculation holds a great influence on the suitability of an algorithm. Several
mesh refinement strategies exist, like the h-method, the p-method, or the r-method, as well as com-
binations of these [14–16]. The h-method provides the division of an element into smaller elements,
while the p-method increases the element order [17]. In both cases, a higher number of collocation
points within a certain area of the boundary improves the quality of approximation applied to the
variation of boundary values, thus the calculation error is reduced. In consideration of the efficiency,
only those parts of the boundary are refined, which are assumed to make a significant contribution to
the global error. Therefore, error indicators for every element are determined a posteriori from pre-
ceding numerical results, as in [18] or [19]. Bantle [20], for example, uses the h h=2 method for a
posteriori error estimation, while Giuggiani [21] extracts the indicators from additional calculations
with displaced collocation points. Another possibility is the ZZ-type a posteriori error estimator,
which is based on [22] for the FEM, and also applied to the BEM [23]. An overview for the dif-
ferent types is given in [24], but most of the algorithms are either formulated for 2D problems, the
Laplace equation, or the Galerkin BEM.
In the present study, the conventional BEM employs the FMM based on collocation points for
applications with arbitrary element orders and mesh refinement strategies predicated on the p-
method. The Burton–Miller formulation is used to overcome the critical frequencies arising for
exterior acoustic problems, thus the developed BEM is applicable for a wide frequency range. An
integration technique for kernel functions of hypersingular character is applied, which makes the
Burton–Miller method feasible for arbitrary element orders, as well. Further, the developed fast mul-
tipole boundary element method (FMBEM) is extended by an adaptive mesh refinement algorithm
based on a combination of the h-method and the p-method. The h-p refinement strategy significantly
improves the accuracy of the numerical results, while the FMM further increases the efficiency
of this algorithm. The high capability of the developed formulation is demonstrated by means of
numerical examples. The obtained results clearly indicate the high precision attainable at low com-
putational effort, thus the developed algorithm is highly suitable for large-scale acoustic problems
with high accuracy requirements in a wide frequency range.
This paper is organized as follows. In Section 2, the basic relations of the BEM in acoustics are
briefly recapitulated. The FMM is reviewed, as well as the Burton–Miller formulation of the BIE.
Further, shape functions for arbitrary element orders are presented, and the integration of hypersin-
gular kernels over these arbitrary order elements is discussed. Section 3 provides a description of
the applied adaptive h-p refinement algorithm. In Section 4, the developed formulation is proved
concerning its high accuracy and efficiency by numerical examples. The paper is rounded off by a
conclusion of this study in Section 5.
Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Int. J. Numer. Meth. Engng 2017; 110:842–861
DOI: 10.1002/nme
844 S. KEUCHEL, K. VATER AND O. VON ESTORFF
2. FAST MULTIPOLE BOUNDARY ELEMENT METHOD
2.1. Boundary integral formulation for acoustic problems

Under consideration of time-harmonic acoustic waves, the propagation of acoustic pressure p in a
homogeneous medium is governed by the Helmholtz equation
r 2 p.x/ D k 2 p.x/ ; (1)
where k D !c denotes the wave number with the angular frequency ! and the sound-propagation
velocity c. The boundary integral equation is given by
Z
@Gk .x; y/
c.x/p.x/ D Gk .x; y/q.y/ p.y/ d ; (2)
@ny

where Gk is called fundamental solution for 3D acoustic problems, defined as

1 ikjrj
Gk .x; y/ D e ; (3)
4jrj
with the distance vector r D x y between source point y and field point x, and the normal
derivative of the acoustic pressure called acoustic flux
@p.y/
q.y/ D : (4)
@ny
1
Further, c.x/ denotes a boundary factor, which becomes c.x/ D 2
for field point x being on a
smooth part of the surface .
2.2. Burton–Miller formulation of the boundary integral equation

As mentioned before, the CBIE suffers from the non-uniqueness problem arising for exterior
acoustic problems. For certain frequencies accordant with the eigenfrequencies of the interior prob-
lem involving the same boundary, the CBIE provides no unique solution. Burton and Miller [9]
developed a method to overcome this difficulty by combining the CBIE with its normal derivative
Z
@Gk .x; y/ @Gk .x; y/
c.x/q.x/ D q.y/ p.y/ d: (5)
@nx @nx ny

Both CBIE and HBIE have just one solution in common for every positive wave number k, thus a
linear combination according to
(CBIE) C ˛(HBIE) D 0 (6)
yields an unique solution for all frequencies. A complex valued coupling constant ˛ has proven to
be a suitable choice [25]. It is worth noticing that the critical frequencies of exterior problems have
no physical meaning. They simply arise from the mathematical formulation of the BIE.
2.3. Discretization with arbitrary element order
Discretizing the boundary as follows, the surface integral defined by Equation (6) can be split up
into integrals over smaller parts called boundary elements, such that
0 1
N
XB Z
@Gk .x; y/ C
ci .x/ .pi .x/ C ˛qi .x// D @ Gk .x; y/ C ˛ j .y/dj A qj
@nx
j D1 j
0 1 (7)
N
X Z
B @Gk .x; y/ @Gk .x; y/ C
@ C˛ j .y/dj A pj ;
@ny @nx @ny
j D1 j
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Figure 1. Positioning of collocations points inside an element.
where subscripts i and j refer to field point and source point, respectively, and ci represents the
boundary factor related to point i. The integral over j corresponds to an integration over all ele-
ments associated with the collocation point j . The variation of boundary value p assigned to point
j over element m as a function of y can be written as
pjm .y/ D jm .y/pj ; (8)
thus the dependency on y is turned over to the shape function jm .y/, and the boundary value
related to point j can be extracted from the integral. According to the collocation method, the source
point y is placed subsequently at every collocation point, which finally yields the linear system
of equations
Ax D y: (9)
As discontinuous elements [26] are used in this study, the position of the collocations points on an
element are defined by the zeros of the Legendre polynomials. The shape functions for quadrangular
elements are given by the 2D polynomial interpolation formula
p
Y p
Y
l k
kl .; / D ; (10)
k l l k
lD0;l¤k kD0;k¤l
where p denotes the element’s order, and subscripts k and l define the position of the collocation
point on the element according to Figure 1.
It is worth pointing out that discontinuous elements, in contrast to the widespread continu-
ous approach, are able to represent jumps in the acoustic quantities. This may be the case, for
example, when discontinuous boundary conditions are to be applied. Furthermore, the chosen
approach ensures C 1 continuity at the element edges, which becomes essential for the use within
the Burton–Miller formulation of the BIE.
2.4. Numerical treatment of singular integrals
The numerical treatment of singular and also nearly singular integrals plays an important role in
the formulation of the BEM. Especially for higher order elements, this is a crucial part for accurate
solutions because of the placement of the collocation points. Because more collocation points are
located inside an element, the number of singular integrals rises, and hence, more sources of errors
occur in contrast to constant elements providing only one nodal point at the center of the element.
The use of higher order elements also increase the inexactness because of nearly singular integration.
Collocation points may be located very close to the edge of an element, causing problems when
integrating over adjacent elements. The framework to overcome these problems for arbitrary element
orders is presented in the succeeding texts.
For weakly singular integrands, many well-known methods are feasible to remove the singular-
ity, among those is the polar coordinate transformation [27] or the duffy transformation [28]. The
DOI: 10.1002/nme
algorithm used in this work is presented by Lachat and Watson [29]. It is based on a transformation
whose Jacobian vanishes as the singularity is reached, and it is capable of utilizing arbitrary ansatz
functions. The element is split up into triangles by means of connecting the singular point with the
nodal points located at the corners of the element. The singular point is degenerated by a transfor-
mation of the resulting triangle to a quadrangle, and afterwards, standard Gaussian integration can
be applied. However, the hypersingular integrands need to be focused more on, because they imply
a higher error to the solution. The following sections deal with the numerical integration of these
kernel functions in the scope of arbitrary element orders.
2.4.1. Hypersingular integration for arbitrary element orders. In order to numerically integrate
the hypersingular kernel enclosed by the HBIE, an algorithm suitable for any element order needs
to be developed. One possibility consists of a regularization technique presented in [11] and [30],
which leads to integrals that are at worst weakly singular. In this work, another method proposed
by Guiggiani [13] for the evaluation of hypersingular integrals is employed. It is based on a Laurent
series expansion and holds a low computational complexity. The integral can be expressed as
Z
I D K.x; y.; //.; / jJ.; /j dd ; (11)
A
where K.x; y.; // denotes the kernel function, .; / represents the ansatz function, and jJ.; /j
is the Jacobian of the transformation from global coordinates to local element coordinates. Using
a polar coordinate transformation of the intrinsic coordinates about the collocation point x with
dd D dd and
D S C cos
(12)
D S C sin ;
the integral with a limiting process ! 0 around the singularity yields
Z 2 Z ./
I D lim K.; /.; / jJ.; /j dd : (13)
./!0 0 ./
The resulting singularity order is reduced by one because of the polar coordinate transformation
F .; / D K.; /.; / jJ.; /j D O.2 / : (14)
The integrand can be expressed as a Laurent series expansion about D 0
F2 ./ F1 ./
F .; / D C C O.1/ ; (15)
2
where the derivation of the terms F2 ./ and F1 ./ is summarized in A. These terms just depend
on the series expansion of K, and J with respect to . The derivatives of these three functions
concerning the ansatz order () or shape (J ) are given in a closed form formula by the presented
framework for arbitrary element orders. Hence, the preliminaries for the following algorithm are
preexisting. Subtracting and adding back the two terms of the series expansion, the integral (13) is
split up into two integrals
Z 2 Z ./
F2 ./ F1 ./
I D lim F .; / C dd
./!0 0 ./ 2
Z 2 Z ./
F2 ./ F1 ./ (16)
C lim 2
C dd
./!0 0 ./
D I0 C I 1 :
From a mathematical point of view, no approximation is introduced in this equation, because those
functions approached by the series expansion are just subtracted and added back. The term F .; /
enclosed by the first integral I0 remains the same as in the original formulation. This integral is of
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regular character due to the singularity subtraction, and therefore taking the limit . / ! 0, the
integral finally becomes
Z 2 Z ./
F2 ./ F1 ./
I0 D F .; / C dd (17)
0 0 2
and can be treated by standard Gaussian quadrature rules for double integrals. Taking the limit of I1
and integrating analytically, a regular line integral arises:
Z 2 Z ./
F2 ./ F1 ./
I1 D lim 2
C dd
./!0 0 ./
Z 2 (18)
F2 ./
D C F1 ./ ln ./ d :
0 ./
2.4.2. Evaluation of nearly singular integrals. The positioning of collocation points for arbitrary
order elements leads to nearly singular integrals, as described in the following.
If a higher order element is used, collocation points may be located very close to the edges of
the source element, although not on this element, thus because of the incorporated hypersingular
boundary integral equation errors relating to the numerical integration may occur. In order to over-
come this problem, a sinh transformation [31] is employed. In this transformation, the projection
of the collocation point onto the elements 0 and 0 , as well as the distance b between the colloca-
tion point and this projected point, is considered. The Jacobian of the transformation weakens the
singularity, as the distance approaches the near singular region.
The coordinates u; v are transformed to the local coordinates and in the following way
D 0 C b sinh.
1 u 1 /
(19)
D 0 C b sinh.
2 v 2 / ;
with

1 1 C 0 1 0

1 D arcsinh C arcsinh
2 b b

1 1 C 0 1 0
1 D arcsinh arcsinh
2 b b
(20)
1 1 C 0 1 0

2 D arcsinh C arcsinh
2 b b

1 1 C 0 1 0
2 D arcsinh arcsinh :
2 b b
The Jacobian of this transformation can be expressed as
jJ j D
1 b cosh.
1 u 1 /
2 cosh.
2 v 2 / : (21)
The closest point on the element to the collocation point has to be calculated and expressed in
terms of local coordinates 0 and 0 . As a consequence of the nonlinear transformation from the
local element to the global coordinate system, a multidimensional Newton–Raphson method has to
be applied to compute the local coordinates from the global coordinates. The transformation allows
a more accurate evaluation of the nearly singular integrals arising from the usage of higher order
elements. The application of this procedure is controlled by the distance of the collocation point
to the closest point on the element relative to the edge length of the element, where a ratio of 0.5
for the hypersingular integrands and a ratio of 0.1 for strongly singular integrands are thought to
be a good choice. The weakly singular integrands are treated with standard Gaussian quadrature as
already described at the beginning of this section.
DOI: 10.1002/nme
2.5. Fast multipole method

As already mentioned, one of the main disadvantages of the BEM consists of the dense and non-
symmetric system matrices. By using iterative solvers in combination with the FMM, a quasi-linear
dependency of CPU time and memory requirement on the degrees of freedom can be achieved.
Thus, large-scale systems are able to be calculated. A brief review on the mathematical formulation
of the FMM based on collocation points is given in the following [32]. The algorithm requires
a hierarchical tree structure, which clusters the collocation points in so-called boxes on different
levels. According to Gegenbauer’s addition theorem, the fundamental solution can be approximated
by a series expansion as follows:
ik X
1
G.x; y/ D .2l C 1/.1/l jl .kjDj/Pl DO dO
4
lD0
Z
ik
e i k.xza /Os
.4/2 S2 „ ƒ‚ …
R.x;á ;Os / (22)
p
X
.2l C 1/i l h.1/
l
O e i k.zb y/Os ds ;
.k jDj/e i kdOs Pl .OsD/ „ ƒ‚ …
lD0 R.´b ;y;Os /
„ ƒ‚ …
ML .zb ;za ;Os/
where the vector D D ´b á denotes the distance between the center of box a containing the field
point and box b containing the source points and d D x á C ´b y. Further, Pl defines the
l-th degree Legendre polynomial, jl represents the spherical Bessel function of the first kind, and
O D jj denotes a normalized vector. The approximation additionally depends on the spherical Hankel
function h.1/
l
, on the expansion length p, and on an integration over the unit sphere S2 with its unit
sphere directions sO . As arbitrary order elements are used in this study, and therefore a collocation
point-based FMM is employed, the shape functions have to be considered when calculating the
multipole moments. Thus, the bundled influence of all source points j within a certain box b is
obtained by
" #
q
X Z
Fb .Os/ D R.yj ; ´b ; sO /j .x/dj qj (23)
j
j 2b
for the acoustic flux q and

" #
X Z
Fbp .Os/ D ik .Os nx / R yj ; ´b ; sO j .x/dj pj (24)
j
j 2b
for the acoustic pressure p. The translation operator R .u; v; sO / shifting information from u to v is
given by
R .u; v; sO / D eik.uv/Os : (25)
This operator is used for multipole-to-multipole and local-to-local translation, whereas the
multipole-to-local translation operator is
p
X
ML .á ; ´b ; sO / D .2l C 1/il h.1/
l
.kjDj/ eikd sO Pl sO D
O : (26)
lD0
This operator transforms the multipole moments Fb into local expansion coefficients Na as follows:
Na .Os/ D ML .á ; ´b ; sO / Fb .Os/ : (27)
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Thus, the influence of all source points on field point i enclosed by box a is finally obtained by
summation of the near field and the far field contribution. One obtains
Z
@G @G @G
c .p C ˛q/ D Gq p C˛ q p dNF
NF @ny @nx @nx @ny
Z (28)
ik
C eik.xi á /Os ŒNa .Os/ .1 C ˛ik nx sO / ds ;
2
.4/ S2 „ ƒ‚ …
G.nx ;Os/
where the factor G .nx ; sO / D .1 C ˛ik nx sO / takes into account the Burton–Miller formulation.
In order to numerically implement the FMM, a hierarchical box tree structure is required, which
consists of cubical boxes on different levels containing the collocation points. At first, the level l D 0
is created, represented by one box enclosing all the nodes. Afterwards, this box is split up recursively
into eight child boxes until no box exceeds a limiting prescribed number of collocation points. The
smallest boxes on the highest level are called leafs. Two further properties of the tree structure
are of particular importance for the algorithm, the nearfield (NF) and the interaction list (IL). The
NF or neighborhood consists of the adjacent boxes sharing at least one corner with the box under
consideration. The IL of a box contains all boxes on the same level, where the boxes are not part of
the NF on the same level, but the parent boxes are neighbors. These two properties are illustrated in
Figure 2 for a simplified two-dimensional tree.
A crucial point for the efficiency of the algorithm is the adjustment of the expansion length p,
which is obtained by a semi-empirical formula [10]
p.kD/ D kD C c ln .kD C / ; (29)
where D is the edge length of the box considered, k denotes the wave number, and c 2 : : : 5
is a parameter for an additional accuracy. Hence, the expansion length has to be adapted in terms
of frequency and the box size corresponding to the actual level. This can be incorporated by means
of an interpolation and filtering, which is described in [33] and be efficiently implemented by an
FFT and iFFT. This procedure ensures a low error and good efficiency of the approximated matrix
vector multiplication by the FMM. In fact, the overall error introduced by the FMM turns out to be
negligibly small compared with the discretization error as a consequence of using shape functions
on surface elements of finite size.
The algorithm is split up into an upward pass and a downward pass and can be summarized
as follows:
(1) The upward pass starts at the leafs and provides the calculation of the multipole moments
with Equations (23) and (24).
(2) The mulipole moments are shifted upwards by the multipole-to-multipole operator (25) and
summed up for each box until level l D 2 is reached.
Figure 2. Nearfield (NF) and interaction list (IL) of a hierarchical tree structure.
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(3) The downward pass starts at level l D 2 and calculates the local expansion of the boxes by the
multipole-to-local operator (26) from the boxes in the IL. Thereafter, the local expansion is
shifted downwards by means of the local-to-local operator (25). These two steps are repeated
for every box on each level, until every leaf has received its local expansion.
(4) In the last step, the information of the boxes in the NF are calculated as in the classical BEM,
and the influence of the farfield is given in a compressed manner by the local expansion of
the FMM. This step is computed as shown in Equation (28).
3. ADAPTIVE H-P MESH REFINEMENT
The accuracy and efficiency achieved by a boundary element calculation strongly depends on the
discretization of the boundary in terms of the number of elements, see Figure 3, as well as the order
of the shape functions describing the variation of boundary values over the surface, see Figure 4. The
selection of a suitable mesh for a boundary value problem plays a very important role in numerical
calculation methods such as the BEM. In this study, a combination of h-refinement and p-refinement
is employed, in order to extend the critical parts of the discretization [16]. These are those elements,
which are assumed to have a strong influence on the global error. While the h-method provides the
subdivision of an element into four smaller elements of the same order by halving the edge length
(h refers to a characteristic geometric parameter), the p-method implies the increase of the elements
order by one. Both the h-refinement and p-refinement strategy lead to a higher number of collocation
points per area, thus the variation of boundary values over the surface can be described in a more
accurate manner, and the global error of the calculation is reduced.
3.1. A posteriori error estimation

In order to extract those elements, which are to be refined, error indicators are computed a posteriori
for every element. If the error indicator of an element exceeds a limiting value pre-defined by the
user, either h-refinement or p-refinement is applied. The a posteriori error estimation turns out to be
the key factor for the performance of an adaptive mesh refinement algorithm. Several approaches
already exist, for instance, the h h=2 method [14] or the enhanced p p C 1 approach [20].
Figure 3. Approximation of a given 1D boundary value variation by one and four linear elements,
respectively.
Figure 4. Approximation of a given 1D boundary value variation by the first and third order polynomial,
respectively.
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Additionally, some simple nodal value-based techniques are developed, which are described in detail
within the following section.
3.1.1. Nodal value-based indicators. The key idea of nodal value-based error indicators consists
of the assumption that the variation of boundary values over an element is more complex the more
the nodal boundary values vary related to the average boundary value of the element. Those high
variations lead to great error indicator values, which trigger element refinement, and therefore a
more accurate approximation of the supposed complex boundary value variation. The described
nodal value-based error indicator is defined by
K
X j .jpk j pmean / j

Q 1 D ; (30)
K
kD1
where K is the number of collocation points associated with the element, and pmean denotes the
elements mean pressure
K
X jpk j
pmean D : (31)
K
kD1
As this error indicator consists of an absolute value for the average difference between the element’s
mean acoustic pressure or flux, respectively, and the nodal boundary values, an additional division
of the indicator by the mean value is provided to achieve a more relative character:

Q 1

1 D : (32)
pmean
Those nodal value-based error indicators are quite easy to implement and provide less computational
effort, as boundary values in the collocations points are computed anyway for every mesh refinement
cycle, and no additional computation has to be employed. On the other hand, the described error
indicator fails in cases where the key assumption of high nodal value variations related to complex
boundary value variations over the whole element does not prove true, as illustrated in Figure 5. In
the first case, the element obtains a high error indicator value as the nodal values differ highly from
the mean value (dotted line), although the actual boundary value variation (black line) is approxi-
mated in an accurate manner (red line). In the second case, the element obtains a low error indicator
value, even though it needs to be refined.
3.1.2. hh=2 and ppC1 method. Both hh=2 [14] and ppC1 error indicators [20] are based
on additional calculations with uniformly refined meshes either by the h-method or the p-method
or a combination of both. In this way, the actual improvement in approximating the boundary value
variation over the elements, which can be achieved by refinement, is pre-calculated:
R
j.jpj jpref j/jde

Q 2 D e R ; (33)
e jpref jde
Figure 5. Nodal value-based error indicator failures, mean value (red dotted line), actual boundary value
(black line), and approximated boundary value (red line).
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where p represents the boundary value computed with the unrefined mesh, and pref denotes the
boundary value calculated employing the uniformly refined mesh. The integration is performed over
the unrefined element e , thus the Gaussian points need to be transformed into the subelements
coordinate system to extract the pref value if the h h=2 method is used. Afterwards, the obtained
indicator values are scaled in terms of the element order p and the division level ld , similar to [20]:

Q 2

2 D ; (34)
e
where e can be interpreted as a local collocation point density related to the element, given by
e D 4ld .p C 1/2 : (35)
As the described error indicator provides much computational effort compared with the nodal value-
based error indicators, it is more suitable for multiple frequency analysis, where the refinement
is performed only for one frequency at the beginning of the computation, and the resulting mesh
is used for all further calculations. Apart from the high CPU time and memory requirement, the
h h=2 and p p C 1 error indicators are much more accurate in certain cases like those illustrated
in Figure 5. Here, the second indicator leads to low values in the first and high values in the second
case, just as one would expect.
3.2. h-p refinement algorithm

The adaptive mesh refinement algorithm described next combines the h-method and p-method,
where distinction between the actual applied refinement strategy is made with respect to the posi-
tion of the element, either adjacent to a geometric singularity or on a rather smooth part of the
surface. Further, an a posteriori error estimation method is employed to determine those elements
that have to be refined. The algorithm, often proposed in literature [16, 20], can be divided into the
following steps:
(1) First, a basic discretization is applied, which has to be at least fine enough to describe the
models geometry and boundary conditions. The element order is set to zero for all elements.
(2) Next, an initial BEM calculation is performed to extract an error indicator for every element.
(3) If the value of an indicator exceeds the limiting value, the considered element is refined:
(a) If the variation of boundary values over the element is expected to be smooth, p-
refinement is applied.
(b) If the element is adjoined to a geometric singularity, that is, it does form a right or
acute angle with one of its neighbor elements, the element is subdivided according to
the h-method.
(4) After all elements have been checked for refinement in terms of its error indicator values, the
mesh is smoothed such that two neighboring elements do not exceed a difference of p 6 1
and ld 6 1.
(5) The algorithm is repeated starting from step 2, until all elements fall below the limiting error
indicator value, or a maximum number of refinement cycles is reached.
The presented h-p refinement strategy has been investigated by several authors mainly in the
context of continuous elements. In the current version of the hp FMBEM, however, discontinuous
shape functions are employed. These are characterized by the ability to take into account jumps in
the acoustic pressure accompanied by geometric singularities. For this reason, the effectiveness of
element subdivision near edges and corners may be expected to be less compared with h-refinement
of continuous elements. A study of the actual behavior of discontinuous elements within the h-p
algorithm is provided in the following section.
4. NUMERICAL EXAMPLES
Within the following section, the efficiency of the presented apative FMBEM formulation is shown
on the basis of two appropriate examples. Both test cases involve sound radiating surfaces, which are
DOI: 10.1002/nme
also referred to as exterior or noise emission problems. The geometries are assumed to be surrounded
by an acoustic domain, whose properties correspond to air with a density D 1:21 kg/m3 and speed
of sound c D 343 m/s.
4.1. L-shape
An L-shape is chosen for verifying the presented method, see Figure 6. The geometry consists of
three cubes with an edge length of 1 m in the positive octant of a Cartesian coordinate system. It is a
classical example for hp methods because of the edges and corners causing numerical difficulties. A
Neumann boundary condition is set according to an equivalent monopole source at x D 0:2; y D 0:3
and ´ D 0:1. This allows the calculation of an error between the numerical and analytical solution.
4.1.1. Verifying the burton miller formulation. The implemented Burton–Miller formulation within
the FMBEM is supposed to hold a unique solution for the whole frequency range. Hereby the
crucial part is the integration of the hypersingular kernel for different element orders. The geome-
try is discretized by 224 elements with varying element orders p D 0 : : : 5, the resulting degrees
of freedom are given by N D 224 : : : 8064. Within the investigated frequency range defined by
f D 100 Hz : : : 1000 Hz, the Burton–Miller formulation is compared with the solution of the
CBIE, where the initial discretization employs constant elements corresponding to 13.6 elements
per wavelength at f D 100 Hz.
In Figure 7, the error over the frequency is plotted. The results show the correct implementation
of the arbitrary order elements. It becomes obvious that the error decreases due to a uniform p-
refinement, and the Burton–Miller formulation gives a unique solution for the whole frequency
Figure 6. L-shape geometry with 224 elements. [Colour figure can be viewed at wileyonlinelibrary.com]
Figure 7. Error over frequency for different orders and Burton–Miller approach (BM).
DOI: 10.1002/nme
range. It should be noted that for higher order elements, the integration order has to be increased to
achieve further reduction of the error.
The critical frequencies can be figured out easily for the CBIE according to the peaks in the error
plot, hence a correct solution for every frequency would not be guaranteed. One minor drawback
of the additionally used HBIE in combination with higher order elements, starting at p D 4, is the
slightly higher error at the non-critical frequencies. Because of the higher order elements, the collo-
cation points are located closer to the edge of the element, and therefore, more nearly hypersingular
integrals arise. Hence, a higher integration order is needed, and a further increase could reduce this
small deviation. Moreover, the FMM additionally allows a far more efficient calculation, because
the computational effort increases just according to a quasi-linear complexity with respect to the
number of unknowns. The degrees of freedom may rise rapidly especially if higher order elements
are utilized, for example, the order p D 5 holds a factor of 36 for the system dimension compared
with constant elements.
4.1.2. Investigation of the h-p algorithm. After the verification of the uniform p-refinement, the
h-p algorithm is investigated. The geometry and excitation is the same as in the previous section,
and the analyzed frequency is given by f D 100 Hz. As a reference, the uniform h-refinement and
p-refinement of a mesh with 224 constant elements are calculated to show the advantages of the
adaptive refinement. Two different a posteriori error estimators as described in Section 3.1 are used
with different residual values r. For comparison, an adaptive p-refinement as well as two different
h-p refinement strategies are shown. In Figure 8, the error over the dimension is depicted.
Both the uniform h-refinement and p-refinement show the decrease of the error with higher system
dimensions, wherein the p-refinement offers much steeper decrease than expected from the literature
on h-p algorithms in the context of continuous elements. The p-refinement exhibits a much lower
error than the h-refinement at the same number of unknowns. The error estimator shows a similar
behavior for different refinement strategies.
The nodal value-based error estimator
1 shows steep decrease of the error for the first three
refinement steps; afterwards, the number of unknowns rises, but no further significant reduction of
the error can be figured out. This result is based on the rather simple error estimator, which just
depends on relative differences of the unknowns at the collocation point. This does not necessarily
correspond to an error in the solution, but because of the simple approach, no costly calculations
have to be carried out. In contrast, the second error estimator
2 provides higher computing cost,
where a second BEM calculation is performed. The discretization is first uniformly h-refined (h
h=2), corresponding to a multiplication of the number of unknowns by 4, and then the element
order is increased by one (p p C 1). Afterwards, an integration of the difference between the two
solutions over an element is incorporated, resulting in a more precise refinement rule. The results
Figure 8. Error over dimension.
DOI: 10.1002/nme
confirm this approach by lower errors with just a slight increase of the dimension. In contrast to the
first error estimator, even advanced refinement steps lead to a decrease of the error.
The residual values for the error estimators work as expected for all combinations, with a lower
threshold value more elements are detected for refinement, and a lower error is reached. This is
discovered for the different refinement strategies as well as for various error estimators. As the
limiting value is a tuning parameter for the calculation, it can be decreased to reach the desired
quality of the results. A higher value can be used to refine just a few elements, where the quality of
the solution improves at low computational cost. Using a very small value may lead to a subdivision
of all elements, and therefore the efficiency is reduced and leads to results similar to an uniform
refinement. The value has to be treated carefully, and a trade-off between efficiency and a low error
should be aimed for.
Three different adaptive refinement strategies are analyzed, represented by the p-refinement as
well as two different hp-refinement strategies. The adaptive p-refinement can reduce the error to the
same value as the uniform p-refinement with much less number of unknowns. The first hp-algorithm
referred to as “hp” takes into account whether an element is located at a geometrical singularity in
terms of adjacent normal vectors or not. The elements sharing at least one edge with a geometri-
cal singularity are h-refined, whereas all other elements are p-refined. Although this algorithm leads
to a decrease of the error, the steepness tends to the uniform h-refinement due to the number of h-
refined elements. With the more precise error estimator, it reaches roughly the error of the uniform
p-refinement at the same dimension. The second hp version referred to as "hpmod " additionally
increases the element order at the geometrical singularities. It exhibit the same qualitative charac-
teristics as the adaptive p-method, but the number of degrees of freedom is higher based on the
additional element subdivision. When subdividing the right elements in terms of the error estima-
tor, no difficulties in context of geometrical singularities occur. This is in contrast to hp-algorithms
commonly used in the context of continuous boundary elements, but can be explained. Continuous
elements are known to cause problems at nodes belonging to elements with different normal vectors
and are not able to represent jumps in the acoustic quantities over the model surface. Using discon-
tinuous elements, as in the presented study, this problem is already solved in the formulation. Hence,
geometrical singularities in terms of edges and corners do not have to treated by an h-refinement,
and the very efficient p-refinement can be applied.
The performance of the algorithm is stated in this investigation. The adaptive p-refinement shows
roughly the same high accuracy as the uniform p-refinement, but just needs about 2000 unknowns
in contrast to about 8000 unknowns. Thus, just a fourth of the dimension is necessary to obtain the
same quality of the solution, which leads to a large reduction of the computational effort. The error
indicator as well as the limiting value has to be treated carefully to reach a good efficiency. The
nodal value-based error indicator can be used, but the number of refinement steps have to be limited
to a few cycles. The more complex error indicator should be used in cases where a high precision
is required. The additional amount of computations can be justified in particular, if a sequence of
linear systems of equations is analyzed, which is common in the frequency domain.
4.1.3. Frequency analysis of the hp algorithm. In acoustical frequency domain problems, often not
only a single frequency is of interest, but a whole range is analyzed. Hence, the presented algorithm
is examined under these circumstances. The same example considered previously is taken, now
concerning the frequency dependency. The refinement is started at two different frequencies f D
100 Hz, as before, and f D 500 Hz. The frequency range is the same as in Section 4.1.1, where the
correct implementation of the Burton–Miller formulation is shown. The previous results are taken
into account, and therefrom, the most efficient combination "adaptive p-refinement,
2 ; r D 0:01"
is used. In Figure 9, the error over the frequency is plotted. For comparison, the uniform p-refined
solutions are illustrated.
The adaptive p-refinement at f D 100 Hz starts at the good result as before, the same error
is reached as for p D 5 with uniform refinement, but only a fourth of the unknowns is needed.
However, the slope is not as good as the uniform refinements, but this is comprehensible, because
dropbox the refinement is based on the solution at the starting frequency. The uniform refinement
has no specialization according to the boundary condition and is therefore usable for a wide range
DOI: 10.1002/nme
Figure 9. Error over frequency for different orders and adaptive refinement.
Figure 10. Tire mesh of about 9000 elements. [Colour figure can be viewed at wileyonlinelibrary.com]
of frequency and excitation. The advantage of the adaptive refinement is still remarkable outside
the starting frequency, and the accuracy is better or at worst the same as for p D 2 with about the
same dimension. The adaptively refined discretization is valid in a range of at nearly 1000 Hz. This
is also approved by the refinement at the second starting frequency f D 500 Hz, where the result is
better than the first one because of the different solution-based refinement. The benefit is kept until
the end of the analyzed frequency range. The example shows that the refinement is valid for a wide
frequency range and not only at the distinct refinement frequency, and in cases where more precise
solutions are necessary, the starting point can easily be adjusted. Hence, the additional effort for the
more complex error estimator can be justified, if a broad frequency range with many steps has to
be examined.
4.2. Tire road noise at high frequencies

In this section, the previous results are combined to show the behavior of the proposed method in
the context of a real engineering problem. The investigation is based on a tire road noise simulation,
similar to the investigation in [34] but now at high frequencies. The analysis starts at a frequency of
f D 4000 Hz, corresponding to a high wavenumber of approximately k D 70 m1 . The geometry of
the tire is taken from the German project "Leiser Straßenverkehr 3" [35]. The mesh of the tire with
a diameter of dt i re D 0:6 m is presented in Figure 10 with approximately 9000 elements, which
corresponds to roughly 10 elements per wavelength at f D 2000 Hz. The road is modeled by a
halfspace in the x; y-plane based on a formulation proposed by [32]. An excitation is used for the
prescribed surface velocities because of an equivalent monopole source at x D 0; y D 0; ´ D 0:2 m.
DOI: 10.1002/nme
Figure 11. Error over frequency for the tire road noise simulation.
In this example, the previously described extensions of the classical BEM are required. The
Burton–Miller formulation is necessary, because an exterior problem is investigated. Especially for
the elements close to the halfspace, the nearly singular integrals are required, and the FMM is rea-
sonable for the high-frequency problem in conjunction with the large scale problem. As a reference,
on the one hand, the element order is increased, and on the other hand, uniformly h-refined meshes
with constant elements are used. These are denoted as “h1” and “h2” in the figures. As this exam-
ple is a more realistic one, the aim should be a fast and robust approach. For this reason, the more
simple error indicator is chosen for the refinement strategy starting with a linear element order to be
in a reliable resolution range to start to the refinement. As in the previous investigation, the adap-
tive refinement is taken into account for the first frequency, while the following frequencies are
computed with the same, refined mesh. In Figure 11, the error over the frequency is plotted.
The results show the expected behavior; the performance of the higher order elements is better
than the uniformly h-refined examples. Comparing the same calculations with the same dimension,
the higher order elements have a factor of about 5 in the accuracy. The adaptive p-refinement behaves
quite well, even with the more simple error indicator. At the first frequency, the error is in the same
range as the uniform element order p D 2 but needs only N 49; 000 degrees of freedom in
contrast to N 83; 000 at p D 2. As expected, the difference becomes larger within the frequency
sweep but only with a moderate increase of the error. Hence, the presented formulation is also
applicable for realistic engineering problems at high frequencies.
5. CONCLUSION
An hp FMBEM for acoustical problems has been presented. A formulation for arbitrary order dis-
continuous elements was introduced, which is the basis for the adaptive p-refinement. Therein, the
most important part turned out to be the numerical integration of the hypersingular integrands aris-
ing from the Burton–Miller formulation to achieve a unique solution for every frequency. The FMM
allows a quasi-linear complexity concerning the system dimension to achieve fast computation
times, especially if the number of unknowns increases. For the adaptive refinement, two different
error indicators have been described to distinguish, which elements should be refined. A simple
nodal-based indicator and a more complex h h=2 and p p C 1 indicator were developed.
The results illustrate the effectiveness of the formulation for a wide frequency range. No problems
because of the critical frequencies occur, and higher order elements increase the accuracy signifi-
cantly. A remark should be pointed at the h-refinement for geometrical singularities at edges and
corners, which is a common procedure in the context of continuous boundary elements. An extra
h-refinement at these conditions does not provide the expected effect. For the presented test cases,
an adaptive p-refinement offers a more efficient solution. This observation is probably due to the
DOI: 10.1002/nme
discontinuous elements used in the current formulation, thus the problem of discontinuity is already
solved implicitly. Both error indicators can reduce the error more efficiently than a uniform refine-
ment. However, for the more simple indicator, a saturation appears, so a small number of refinement
steps are more favorable. The other error indicator can reduce the error even more without a large
dimension increase, but at a cost of additional calculations. Applying the refined discretization to
a frequency sweep, the modification shows a validity also for subsequent frequencies, which can
justify the additional expenses of the second indicator.
Future topics are the application of the new formulation to more realistic problems and its expan-
sion to a more precise geometry description. The actual work is based on a linear element description
of the geometry and focuses on the refinement for the variable description. However, the presented
framework is also applicable for higher order geometry description or in the context of isogeometric
methods, where the geometry is based on a description by NURBS used in CAD tools.
APPENDIX A: SERIES EXPANSION OF THE HYPERSINGULAR INTEGRAND
For the calculation of F2 and F1 , some Taylor series expansions around the source point S ; S
are necessary, which are given in [13]. Starting with the distance vector, which depends on the
geometrical ansatz, functions for the intrinsic coordinates.
" ˇ ˇ #
@xi ˇˇ @xi ˇˇ
xi yi D . S / C . S / C
@ ˇS ;S @ ˇS ;S
" ˇ ˇ
@2 xi ˇˇ . S /2 @2 xi ˇˇ
C . S / . S / (A.1)
@ 2 ˇS ;S 2 @@ ˇS ;S
ˇ #
@2 xi ˇˇ . S /2
C C ::: :
@2 ˇS ;S 2
For polar coordinates .; / and using the chain rule with @ @
D cos ; @
@
D sin , the equation
becomes
" ˇ ˇ #
@xi ˇˇ @xi ˇˇ
xi yi D cos C sin C
@ ˇS ;S @ ˇS ;S
" ˇ ˇ
2 @2 xi ˇˇ cos2 @2 xi ˇˇ
C cos sin
@ 2 ˇS ;S 2 @@ ˇS ;S (A.2)
ˇ #
@2 xi ˇˇ sin2
C 2 ˇ C O 3
@ S ;S 2

D Ai ./ C 2 Bi ./ C O 3 ;
where the coefficients are trigonometric functions multiplied by constants resulting from the eval-
uation of the derivates of the ansatz functions, which are given in the framework of the arbitrary
element orders. For later use, two relations are defined
´ 3 μ1=2
X
2
A./ D ŒAk ./
kD1
(A.3)
3
X
C./ D Ak ./Bk ./ :
kD1
The formula for the taylor series expansion of r D jx yj for different powers n is

C
r D A 1 C n 2 C O nC2 ; n D 1; 2; 3; : : : :
n n n
(A.4)
A
DOI: 10.1002/nme
Using r with n D 1; A./ and C./ to obtain the derivates of r
xi yi Ai ./ C 2 Bi ./ C O.3 /

r;i D D
r A 1 C AC2 C O.3 /
(A.5)
Ai Bi C
D C Ai 3 C O.2 / :
A A A
Equation (A.4) also holds for negative powers, and n D 3 is needed for the 3D fundamental
solution:

1 1 3C 1
3
D 3 3 2 5 CO : (A.6)
r A A
The hypersingular integrand can be written as
1
F .; / D Q.; /.; / jJ.; /j ; (A.7)
r3
°P ±1=2
3 2
with the Jacobian jJ.; /j D kD1 Jk and Q is a regular function of the kernel without the
singularity. The Taylor series expansion of the single terms is
" ˇ ˇ #
@J ˇˇ @J ˇˇ
J D J.S ; S / C ; cos C sin C O.2 /
@ ˇ S S @ ˇS ;S (A.8)
D J0 C J1 C O.2 / ;
ˇ" ˇ #
@ ˇˇ @ ˇˇ
D .S ; S / C ; cos C sin C O.2 /
@ ˇ S S @ ˇS ;S (A.9)
2
D 0 C 1 C O. /
and

Q D 1 C O 2 : (A.10)
Multiplying the given series expansions and neglecting higher powers,

1 3C
F D .0 C 1 /.J0 C J1 /
3 A3 2 A5

1 1 3C
D 2 .0 C 1 /.J0 C J1 /
A3 A5

1 1 3C
D 2 3
5 0 J0 C 0 J1 C 1 J0 C 2 1 J1
A A

1 1 3C
D 2 .0 J0 C .0 J1 C 1 J0 // (A.11)
A3 A5

1 .0 J0 C .0 J1 C 1 J0 // 3C.0 J0 C .0 J1 C 1 J0 //
D 2
A3 A5

1 0 J0 1 0 J1 C 1 J0 3C 0 J0
D 2 C C O.1/
A3 A3 A5
1 1
D 2 .F2 .// C .F1 .// C O.1/:

DOI: 10.1002/nme
The resulting coefficients can now be used to integrate the hypersingular kernels for arbitrary ele-
ment orders correctly. The functions are based on derivatives of the ansatz function for arbitrary
order, for example, for quadrilateral elements defined in terms of local coordinates .; / gives
p
Y p
Y
@kl .; / 1 k
D
@ k l l k
lD0;l¤k kD0;k¤l
2 3 (A.12)
p
X p
Y
4 . l /5
mD0 lD0;l¤k;l¤m
and
p
Y p
Y
@kl .; / l 1
D
@ k l l k
lD0;l¤k kD0;k¤l
2 3 (A.13)
p
X p
Y
4 . k /5 :
mD0 kD0;k¤l;k¤m
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The authors gratefully acknowledge the funding of the cooperative project Leiser Straßenverkehr 3 by the
German Federal Ministry of Economics and Technology because of an act of the German Bundestag.
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INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL FOR NUMERICAL METHODS IN ENGINEERING

Int. J. Numer. Meth. Engng 2017; 110:842–861

hp Fast multipole boundary element method for 3D acoustics

Sören Keuchel*,† , Kerstin Vater and Otto von Estorff

Received 17 April 2015; Revised 24 August 2016; Accepted 17 September 2016

Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

2. FAST MULTIPOLE BOUNDARY ELEMENT METHOD

2.1. Boundary integral formulation for acoustic problems

where Gk is called fundamental solution for 3D acoustic problems, defined as

2.2. Burton–Miller formulation of the boundary integral equation

Figure 1. Positioning of collocations points inside an element.

2.5. Fast multipole method

for the acoustic flux q and

R .u; v; sO / D eik.uv/Os : (25)

Na .Os/ D ML .´a ; ´b ; sO / Fb .Os/ : (27)

p.kD/ D kD C c ln .kD C / ; (29)

3. ADAPTIVE H-P MESH REFINEMENT

3.1. A posteriori error estimation

3.2. h-p refinement algorithm

Figure 8. Error over dimension.

4.2. Tire road noise at high frequencies

APPENDIX A: SERIES EXPANSION OF THE HYPERSINGULAR INTEGRAND

Using r with n D 1; A./ and C./ to obtain the derivates of r

xi yi Ai ./ C 2 Bi ./ C O.3 /

Multiplying the given series expansions and neglecting higher powers,

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Using r with n D 1; A./ and C./ to obtain the derivates of r

xi yi Ai ./ C 2 Bi ./ C O.3 /