To apply the resulting software to large-scale problems. As such, extensive computational effort is confined to regions where solution resolution is inadequate. Estimates of discretization errors are used to control solution accuracy and provide a measure of confidence in the results. In order to solve large problems in reasonable times, adaptive methods must execute efficiently on parallel computers. A good initial partitioning of the space-time domain is not sufficient to assure high performance throughout the computation.
Adaptive enrichment causes load imbalances that necessitate a dynamic redistribution of data.
Several tools that facilitate parallel adaptive FEM computation have been developed at the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. Mesh enrichment procedures perform parallel h-refinement using error indicator information and enrichment thresholds. PMDB holds MDB meshes on each processor that are subsets of the complete one. PMDB provides arbitrary multiple mesh migration, and routines to analyze partition quality. MPI is used for inter-processor communication.