An efficient nonlinear solver and convergence analysis for a viscoplastic flow model

This paper studies a finite element discretization of the regularized Bingham equations that describe viscoplastic flow. Convergence analysis is provided, as we prove optimal convergence with respect to the spatial mesh width but depending inversely on the regularization parameter $\varepsilon$, and also suboptimal (by one order) convergence that is independent of the regularization parameter. An efficient nonlinear solver for the discrete model is then proposed and analyzed. The solver is based on Anderson acceleration (AA) applied to a Picard iteration, and we prove accelerated convergence of the method by applying AA theory (recently developed by authors) to the iteration, after showing sufficient smoothness properties of the associated fixed point operator. Numerical tests of spatial convergence are provided, as are results of the model for 2D and 3D driven cavity simulations. For each numerical test, the proposed nonlinear solver is also tested and shown to be very effective and robust with respect to the regularization parameter as it goes to zero.