SIP-IFVM: An efficient time-accurate implicit MHD model of corona and CME with strong magnetic field

Abstract

CMEs are one of the main drivers of space weather. However, robust and efficient numerical modeling of the initial stages of CME propagation and evolution process in the sub-Alfvenic corona is still lacking. Based on the highly efficient quasi-steady-state implicit MHD coronal model (Feng et al. 2021; Wang et al. 2022a), we further develop an efficient and time-accurate coronal model and employ it to simulate the CME's evolution and propagation. A pseudo-time marching method, where a pseudo time, tau, is introduced at each physical time step to update the solution by solving a steady-state problem on tau, is devised to improve the temporal accuracy. Moreover, an RBSL flux rope whose axis can be designed in an arbitrary shape is inserted into the background corona to trigger the CME event. We call it the SIP-IFVM coronal model and utilize it to simulate a CME evolution process from the solar surface to 20 Rs in the background corona of CR 2219. It can finish the CME simulation covering 6 hours of physical time by less than 0.5 hours (192 CPU cores, 1 M cells) without much loss in temporal accuracy. Besides, an ad hoc simulation with initial magnetic fields artificially increased shows that this model can effectively deal with time-dependent low-beta problems (beta<0.0005). Additionally, an Orszag-Tang MHD vortex flow simulation demonstrates that the pseudo-time-marching method adopted in this coronal model is also capable of simulating small-scale unsteady-state flows. The simulation results show that this MHD coronal model is very efficient and numerically stable and is promising to timely and accurately simulate time-varying events in solar corona with low plasma beta.