A fourth-order scheme for the unsteady compressible Navier-Stokes equations

A computational scheme is described which is second-order accurate in time and fourth-order accurate in space (2-4). This method is applied to study the stability of compressible boundary layers. The laminar compressible Navier-Stokes equations are solved with a time harmonic inflow superimposed on the steady state solution. This results in spatially unstable modes. It is shown that the second-order methods are inefficient for calculating the growth rates and phases of the unstable modes. In contrast the fourth-order method yields accurate results on relatively course meshes.