Diffusive limits of 2D well-balanced schemes for kinetic models of neutron transport

Abstract

Two-dimensional dissipative and isotropic kinetic models, like the ones used in neutron transport theory, are considered. Especially, steady-states are expressed for constant opacity and damping, allowing to derive a scattering S-matrix and corresponding "truly 2D well-balanced" numerical schemes. A first scheme is obtained by directly implementing truncated Fourier–Bessel series, whereas another proceeds by applying an exponential modulation to a former, conservative, one. Consistency with the asymptotic damped parabolic approximation is checked for both algorithms. A striking property of some of these schemes is that they can be proved to be both 2D well-balanced and asymptotic-preserving in the parabolic limit, even when setting up IMEX time-integrators: see Corollaries 3.4 and A.1. These findings are further confirmed by means of practical benchmarks carried out on coarse Cartesian computational grids.