Simulation of seismic wave propagation in an asteroid based upon an unstructured MPI spectral-element method: Blocking and non-blocking communication strategies

Abstract

In order to better understand the internal structure of asteroids orbiting in the Solar system and then the response of such objects to impacts, seismic wave propagation in asteroid 433-Eros is performed numerically based on a spectral-element method at frequencies lying between 2 Hz and 22 Hz. In the year 2000, the NEAR Shoemaker mission to Eros has provided images of the asteroid surface, which contains numerous fractures that likely extend to its interior. Our goal is to be able to propagate seismic waves resulting from an impact in such models. For that purpose we create and mesh both homogeneous and fractured models with a highly-dispersive regolith layer at the surface using the CUBIT mesh generator developed at Sandia National Laboratories (USA). The unstructured meshes are partitioned using the METIS software package in order to minimize edge cuts and therefore optimize load balancing in our parallel blocking or non-blocking MPI implementations. We show the results of several simulations and illustrate the fact that they exhibit good scaling. © 2008 Springer Berlin Heidelberg.