Abstract
•A p-nonconforming discretization of the compressible NS equations is presented.•The discretization is entropy stable, freestream preserving, and conservative.•A local discontinuous Galerkin interior-penalty approach is used for viscous terms.•Interface dissipation terms that maintain entropy stability are developed.
The entropy-conservative/stable, curvilinear, nonconforming, p-refinement algorithm for hyperbolic conservation laws of Del Rey Fernández et al. (2019) is extended from the compressible Euler equations to the compressible Navier–Stokes equations. A simple and flexible coupling procedure with planar interpolation operators between adjoining nonconforming elements is used. Curvilinear volume metric terms are numerically approximated via a minimization procedure and satisfy the discrete geometric conservation law conditions. Distinct curvilinear surface metrics are used on the adjoining interfaces to construct the interface coupling terms, thereby localizing the discrete geometric conservation law constraints to each individual element. The resulting scheme is entropy conservative/stable, element-wise conservative, and freestream preserving. Viscous interface dissipation operators that retain the entropy stability of the base scheme are developed. The accuracy and stability of the resulting numerical scheme are shown to be comparable to those of the original conforming scheme in Carpenter et al. (2014) and Parsani et al. (2016), i.e., this scheme achieves ∼p+1/2 convergence on geometrically high-order distorted element grids; this is demonstrated in the context of the viscous shock problem, the Taylor–Green vortex problem at a Reynolds number of Re=1,600, and a subsonic turbulent flow past a sphere at Re=2,000.