A Fast Adaptive Multipole Algorithm for Particle Simulations

Abstract

Abstract. This paper describes an algorithm for the rapid evaluation of the potential and force fields in systems involving large numbers of particles whose interactions are described by Coulomb’s law. Unlike previously published schemes, the algorithm of this paper has an asymptotic CPU time estimate of O(N), where N is the number of particles in the simulation, and does not depend on the statistics of the distribution for its efficient performance. The numerical examples we present indicate that it should be an algorithm of choice in many situations of practical interest. Key words. N-body problem, plasma physics, molecular dynamics, vortex method, potential theory AMS(MOS) subject classifications.