Spatial Discretization of the Wave Equation using Finite Differences

Connor Donovan, Andrea Dziubek

Mathematics, College of Arts and Science, SUNY Polytechnic Institute, Utica, NY, USA

The goal of this project is to use numerical methods to spatially discretize the wave equation to solve for multiple numerical solutions. The equation is a second order partial differential equation whose solution is a multi-variable function in terms of space and time. We will denote this solution as u(x,t). We will use this equation to model a standing wave and traveling wave on a string of length L.