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A Compact 4th-Order Scheme for the General Acoustic Wave Equation
We deal with the general multidimensional acoustic wave equation, where both the speed of sound and density of a medium are variable, that is physically relevant. For the first time, we develop a new compact scheme for this equation which is three-level in time, three-point in each spatial direction and has the fourth truncation order $\mathcal{O}(|h|^4+h_t^4)$. In addition, the scheme is semi-explicit in time and easily implementable. It non-trivially generalizes a semi-explicit vector compact scheme constructed and studied recently in the much simpler case of the constant density. Although other high-order numerical methods for the general acoustic wave equation were known, the construction of a compact high-order scheme remained an unsolved problem for a long time. Results of computations confirm the high precision of the scheme and its fourth error order not only in the mesh $C$ norm but in the mesh $C^1$ norm as well that is of value in applications.