Long-time stable SAV-BDF2 numerical schemes for the forced Navier-Stokes equations

Abstract: We propose a novel second-order accurate, long-time unconditionally stable time-marching scheme for the forced Navier-Stokes equations. A new Forced Scalar Auxiliary Variable approach (FSAV) is introduced to preserve the underlying dissipative structure of the forced system that yields a uniform-in-time estimate of the numerical solution. In addition, the numerical scheme is autonomous if the underlying model is, laying the foundation for studying long-time dynamics of the numerical solution via dynamical system approach. As an example we apply the new algorithm to the two-dimensional incompressible Navier-Stokes equations. In the case with no-penetration and free-slip boundary condition on a simply connected domain, we are also able to derive a uniform-in-time estimate of the vorticity in $H^1$ norm in addition to the $L^2$ norm guaranteed by the general framework. Numerical results demonstrate superior performance of the new algorithm in terms of accuracy, efficiency, stability and robustness.