A general-purpose IGA mesh generation method: NURBS Surface-to-Volume Guided Mesh Generation

Abstract

The NURBS Surface-to-Volume Guided Mesh Generation (NSVGMG) is a general-purpose mesh generation method, introduced to increase the scope of isogeometric analysis in computing complex-geometry problems. In the NSVGMG, NURBS patch surface meshes serve as guides in generating the patch volume meshes. The interior control points are determined independent of each other, with only a small subset of the surface control points playing a role in determining each interior point. In the updated version of the NSVGMG we are introducing in this article, in the process of determining the location of an interior point in a parametric direction, more weight is given to the closer guides, with the closeness measured along the guides in the other parametric directions. Tests with 2D and 3D shapes show the effectiveness of the NSVGMG in generating good quality meshes, and the robustness of the updated NSVGMG even in mesh generation for complex shapes with distorted boundaries.