Computational General Relativistic Force-Free Electrodynamics: II. Characterization of Numerical Diffusivity

Understand

Scientific codes are an indispensable link between theory and experiment; in (astro-)plasma physics, such numerical tools are one window into the universe's most extreme flows of energy.

• The discretization of Maxwell's equations - needed to make highly magnetized (astro)physical plasma amenable to its numerical modeling - introduces numerical diffusion.
• It acts as a source of dissipation independent of the system's physical constituents.
• Understanding the numerical diffusion of scientific codes is the key to classify their reliability.