Conservative semi-Lagrangian schemes for kinetic equations Part I: Reconstruction

In this paper, we propose and analyze a reconstruction technique which enables one to design high-order conservative semi-Lagrangian schemes for kinetic equations. The proposed reconstruction can be obtained by taking the sliding average of a given polynomial reconstruction of the numerical solution. A compact representation of the high order conservative reconstruction in one and two space dimension is provided, and its mathematical properties are analyzed. To demonstrate the performance of proposed technique, we consider implicit semi-Lagrangian schemes for kinetic-like equations such as the Xin-Jin model and the Broadwell model, and then solve related shock problems which arise in the relaxation limit. Applications to BGK and Vlasov-Poisson equations will be presented in the second part of the paper.