A deforming finite element method analysis of inverse Stefan problems

A deforming FEM (DFEM) analysis of one‐dimensional inverse Stefan problems is presented. Specifically, the problem of calculating the position and velocity of the moving interface from the temperature measurements of two or more sensors located inside the solid phase is addressed. Since the interface velocity is considered to be the primary variable of the problem, the DFEM formulation is found to have many advantages over other traditional front tracking methods. The present inverse formulation is based on a minimization of the error between the calculated and measured temperatures, utilizing future temperature data to calculate current values of the unknown parameters. Also, the use of regularization is found to be useful in obtaining more accurate results, especially when the interface is located far away from the sensors. The method is illustrated with several examples. The effects of the location of the sensors, of the error in the sensor measurements and of several computational parameters were examined.