We propose a fourth-order compact scheme on structured meshes for the Helmholtz equation given by R():= f (x)+D+n 2 = 0. The scheme consists of taking the alpha-interpolation of the Galerkin finite element method and the classical central finite difference method. In 1D, this scheme is identical to the alpha-interpolation method (J. Comput. Appl. Math. 1982; 8(1):15-19) and in 2D making the choice = 0.5 we recover the generalized fourth-order compact Padé approximation (J. 128:325-359) for the analysis of this scheme and its performance on square meshes is compared with that of the quasi-stabilized FEM (Comput. Meth. Appl. Mech. Engrg 1995; 128:325-359). In particular, we show that the relative phase error of the numerical solution and the local truncation error of this scheme for plane wave solutions diminish at the rate O((n ) 4 ), where n, represent the wavenumber and the mesh size, respectively. An expression for the parameter is given that minimizes the maximum relative phase error in a sense that will be explained in Section 4.5. Convergence studies of the error in the L 2 norm, the H 1 semi-norm and the l ∞ Euclidean norm are done and the pollution effect is found to be small.
19As the current problem admits a variational principle, naturally, discretization methods based on variational formulations viz. the Galerkin and the Trefftz-Galerkin-type methods have been preferred to other methods. The Galerkin-type methods are domain-based wherein the integral statement involves only the weak form of the governing differential equation and the sub-space of test-functions are assumed to satisfy a priori the kinematic compatibility and essential boundary conditions. The Trefftz-Galerkin-type methods are boundary-based and are formulated using the reciprocal principle wherein the integral statement involves only the kinematic compatibility and essential boundary conditions of the problem and the sub-space of test-functions are assumed to satisfy a priori the governing differential equation [1,2].In the context of the Galerkin-type methods, the finite element method (FEM) is a powerful technique to systematically generate subspaces of test-functions (classically piecewise polynomial spaces). Some of the earlier works on the use of FEM for the numerical solution of the Helmholtz equation can be found in [3-10] and the references cited therein. In [5,7] error estimates were given for the asymptotic (n 2 assumed sufficiently small) and pre-asymptotic (n assumed sufficiently small) cases, respectively. It was shown that for the discrete problem the LBB ‡ constant can be expressed as h = min{| h m −n 2 |/ h m } [6]. Thus, for the continuous problem (visualized as → 0) the LBB constant can be expressed as = min{| m −n 2 |/ m }, which in an average sense implies that is inversely proportional to the wavenumber n, i.e. ∝ n −1 [6,7]. Thus for high wavenumbers and for the case of degeneracy (n → h m ), the LBB constant for the discrete problem tends to be small which in turn leads to a loss of stability. The loss of stability...