An Unconditionally Energy-Stable Scheme Based on an Implicit Auxiliary Energy Variable for Incompressible Two-Phase Flows with Different Densities Involving Only Precomputable Coefficient Matrices

Abstract: We present an energy-stable scheme for numerically approximating the governing equations for incompressible two-phase flows with different densities and dynamic viscosities for the two fluids. The proposed scheme employs a scalar-valued auxiliary energy variable in its formulation, and it satisfies a discrete energy stability property. More importantly, the scheme is computationally efficient. Within each time step, it computes two copies of the flow variables (velocity, pressure, phase field function) by solving individually a linear algebraic system involving a constant and time-independent coefficient matrix for each of these field variables. The coefficient matrices involved in these linear systems only need to be computed once and can be pre-computed. Additionally, within each time step the scheme requires the solution of a nonlinear algebraic equation about a {\em scalar-valued number} using the Newton's method. The cost for this nonlinear solver is very low, accounting for only a few percent of the total computation time per time step, because this nonlinear equation is about a scalar number, not a field function. Extensive numerical experiments have been presented for several two-phase flow problems involving large density ratios and large viscosity ratios. Comparisons with theory show that the proposed method produces physically accurate results. Simulations with large time step sizes demonstrate the stability of computations and verify the robustness of the proposed method. An implication of this work is that energy-stable schemes for two-phase problems can also become computationally efficient and competitive, eliminating the need for expensive re-computations of coefficient matrices, even at large density ratios and viscosity ratios.