A smooth particle hydrodynamics code to model collisions between solid, self-gravitating objects

Autor(en)
Christoph Schäfer, S. Riecker, Thomas Maindl, Roland Speith, S Scherrer, Wilhelm Kley
Abstrakt

Context. Modern graphics processing units (GPUs) lead to a major increase in the performance of the computation of astrophysical simulations. Owing to the different nature of GPU architecture compared to traditional central processing units (CPUs) such as x86 architecture, existing numerical codes cannot be easily migrated to run on GPU. Here, we present a new implementation of the numerical method smooth particle hydrodynamics (SPH) using CUDA™ and the first astrophysical application of the new code: the collision between Ceres-sized objects. Aims. The new code allows for a tremendous increase in speed of astrophysical simulations with SPH and self-gravity at low costs for new hardware. Methods. We have implemented the SPH equations to model gas, liquids and elastic, and plastic solid bodies and added a fragmentation model for brittle materials. Self-gravity may be optionally included in the simulations and is treated by the use of a Barnes-Hut tree. Results. We find an impressive performance gain using NVIDIA consumer devices compared to our existing OpenMP code. The new code is freely available to the community upon request.

Organisation(en)
Institut für Astrophysik
Externe Organisation(en)
Eberhard Karls Universität Tübingen
Journal
Astronomy & Astrophysics
Band
590
Anzahl der Seiten
17
ISSN
0004-6361
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1051/0004-6361/201528060
Publikationsdatum
06-2016
Peer-reviewed
Ja
ÖFOS 2012
103003 Astronomie, 103004 Astrophysik
Schlagwörter
ASJC Scopus Sachgebiete
Astronomy and Astrophysics, Space and Planetary Science
Link zum Portal
https://ucrisportal.univie.ac.at/de/publications/12c62b1c-3335-4e85-9ebf-bef75e570004