Finite elements with boundary interpolation (Q4032701)

It is well known that numerical results of finite element analysis on the boundary may not be satisfactory. The paper proposes the use of an improved finite element for which the displacement interpolation is confined to the element boundary, while the interior solution approximately satisfies the differential equation. In order to generate the interior solution, the original element is divided into a number of subelements of the same type. As the interior solution is improved, the new element is potentially more accurate than the original one. The approach is also advantageous from the computational point of view. The method is applied to the 2-D Poisson problem using triangular elements with quadratic interpolation. Suitable error measures are defined and convergence is discussed. The paper demonstrates the computational efficiency of the proposed method which may easily be extended to other element types.