Least-cost-path solution

This approximation should suffice for first, second and third order methods, however, at least four numerical solutions are required on substantially different meshes to determine the coefficients and the extrapolated value, c/>cxt. Three sets of calculations can be used to reduce computational cost by taking one of two following path... 

The limitations encountered when obtaining an analytical solution to the conservation equations, as in the present work, differ from those encountered applying direct computational methods. For example, the cost of numerical computations is dependent on the grid and, especially, on the number of species for which conservation equations must be solved additional reactions do not add significantly to the computational effort. With RRA techniques, further limitations arise on the number of different reaction paths that can conveniently be included in the analysis. The analysis typically follows a sequence of reactions that make up the main path of oxidation, the most important reactions, while parallel sequences are treated as perturbations to the main solution and often are sufficiently unimportant to be neglected. The first step thus identifies a skeletal mechanism of 63 elementary steps by omitting the least important steps of the detailed mechanism [44]. 

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