MOOSE: A parallel computational framework for coupled systems of nonlinear equations

摘要

Systems of coupled, nonlinear partial differential equations often arise in simulation of nuclear processes. MOOSE: Multiphysics Object Oriented Simulation Environment, a parallel computational framework targeted at solving these systems, is presented. As opposed to traditional data-flow oriented computational frameworks, MOOSE is founded on the mathematical principle of Jacobian-free Newton-Krylov (JFNK) solution methods. Utilizing the mathematical structure present in JFNK, physics are modularized into 'Kernel s' allowing for rapid production of new simulation tools. In addition, systems are solved fully coupled and fully implicit employing physics based preconditioning which allows for great flexibility even with large variance in time scales. A summary of the mathematics, an inspection of the structure of MOOSE, and several representative solutions from applications built on the framework are presented.