The Sommerville Mesh in Yee-like Schemes

Abstract

The idea of modelling space as two interacting equivalent networks, one for currents, one for magnetic fluxes, pervades computational electromagnetics since its beginnings. The Yee scheme, the TLM method, can thus be interpreted. But this is also true of finite element- or finite volume-inspired more recent proposals, as we show, so the idea is not incompatible with “unstructured” meshes. Yet, meshes with some rotational and translational symmetry (locally, at least) are desirable on many accounts. The tetrahedral Sommerville mesh we describe here, able to fit curved boundaries and yet regular, looks like an interesting compromise.