Projection of the rotation form Navier-Stokes equation onto the half-staggered grid

A projection method for computing incompressible fluid flow is proposed. For the method, the rotation form Navier-Stokes equation (NSE), for which the velocity and the total pressure are employed, is discretized on the half-staggered, finite difference spatial grid. The total pressure couples the static pressure gradient and the convection of momentum in the continuous NSE while the half-staggered grid provides weak pressure-velocity coupling in discrete space. These two features interact synergistically for the discretized NSE to produce smooth pressure fields without additional numerical artifacts such as the momentum interpolation. The method preserves the kinetic energy at the inviscid limit condition. Numerical solutions of the decaying Taylor vortex, the inviscid Taylor vortex, the sudden expansion channel and the square-prism wake are presented.