This paper on "Parallel Adaptive Mesh Generation" was presented at the NAFEMS World Congress on Design, Simulation & Optimisation: Reliability & Applicability of Computational Methods - 9-11 April 1997, Stuttgart, Germany.

Summary

Adaptive finite element methods require a non-uniform refined computational mesh. The mesh size parameters origin from a-priori knowledge or from a-posteriori error estimation in a self-adaptive finite element environment. Large-scale problems in computational mechanics are solved preferably on parallel computers. Geometrically based distribution of the finite element mesh required for parallel solution techniques is usually the result of a partitioning of the existing discretization. In contrast to the common approach to generate and split the finite element mesh on a sequential machine to perform parallel solution we propose a parallel split and generate method without an pre-existing mesh to avoid the serial bottleneck and to improve the partitioning quality.
Input parameters for the proposed parallel adaptive mesh generator are geometry information from usual CAD systems, mesh density information and finite element modeling parameters like boundary conditions, loadings and material properties. The methods ensures an equally distributed load according to equally distributed number of finite elements.