Discretization of integral equations of electromagnetic scattering using mixed mesh elements

Summary form only given. Many numerical methods have been developed to solve electromagnetic scattering and radiation problems involving conducting and/or dielectric objects. For most integral equation based methods, small flat triangular patches are used to model a three-dimensional complex surface. Using triangle as mesh element has the advantage of flexibility, and hence almost all commercial mesh generating software support this mesh type. Quadrangle mesh has also been applied to discretize the surface integral equations. If hybrid surface and volume integral equations are to be discretized, the number of unknowns can be significantly different for different mesh elements. We developed a discretization scheme that employs different types of elements to model complex surface and volume scatterer. In the initial step, we use mixed triangle and quadrangle in a surface mesh, and mixed prism and hexahedron as volume mesh elements. Numerical results will be shown in the presentation to demonstrate the validity and the application of the mixed element discretization scheme for solving the hybrid integral equations.