THREE-DIMENSIONAL FINITE ELEMENT MESHING BY INCREMENTAL NODE INSERTION

This paper describes an efficient algorithm for fully automated threedimensional finite element meshing which is applicable to non-convex geometry and non-manifold topology. This algorithm starts with sparsely placed nodes on the boundaries of a geometric model and a corresponding 3-D Delaunay triangulation. Nodes are then inserted incrementally by checking the tetrahedral mesh geometry and topological compatibility between Delaunay triangulation and the geometric model. Topological compatibility is checked in a robust manner by a method which relies more on a meshʹs topology than its geometry. The node placement strategy is tightly coupled to an incremental Delaunay triangulation algorithm, and results in a low growth rate of computational time