Anisotropic meshes and streamline-diffusion stabilization for convection-diffusion problems

We study a convection-diffusion problem with dominant convection. Anisotropic streamline aligned meshes with high aspect ratios are recommended to resolve characteristic interior and boundary layers and to achieve high accuracy. We address the question of how the stabilization parameter in the streamline-diffusion FEM (SDFEM) and the Galerkin least-squares FEM (GLSFEM) should be chosen inside the layers. Using a residual free bubbles approach, we show that within the layers the stabilization must be drastically reduced. Copyright (c) 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.