Parallel mesh refinement for 3-D finite element electromagnetics with tetrahedra: strategies for optimizing system communication

Communication strategies in parallel finite element methods can greatly affect system performance. The communication cost for a proposed parallel 3-D mesh refinement method with tetrahedra is analyzed. A Petri Nets-based model is developed for a target mesh refinement algorithm and parallel computing system architecture, which simulates the inter-processor communication. Subsequently, estimates for performance measures are derived from discrete event simulations. The potential benefits of this approach for developing high performance parallel mesh refinement algorithms are demonstrated by optimizing the system communication costs for varying problem size and numbers of processors. Index Terms--Adaptive systems, electromagnetic analysis, finite element methods, parallel processing, software methodology.