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New implicit and implicit-explicit time-stepping methods for the wave equation in second-order form are described with application to two and three-dimensional problems discretized on overset grids. The implicit schemes are single step, three levels in time, and based on the modified equation approach. Second and fourth-order accurate schemes are developed and they incorporate upwind dissipation for stability on overset grids. The fully implicit schemes are useful for certain applications such as the WaveHoltz algorithm for solving Helmholtz problems where very large time-steps are desired. Some wave propagation problems are geometrically stiff due to localized regions of small grid cells, such as grids needed to resolve fine geometric features, and for these situations the implicit time-stepping scheme is combined with an explicit scheme: the implicit scheme is used for component grids containing small cells while the explicit scheme is used on the other grids such as background Cartesian grids. The resulting partitioned implicit-explicit scheme can be many times faster than using an explicit scheme everywhere. The accuracy and stability of the schemes are studied through analysis and numerical computations. 

Simulations of inertial confinement fusion (ICF) experiments require high-fidelity models for laser beam propagation in a nonuniform plasma with varying index of refraction. We describe a new numerical wave solver that is applicable to centimeter-scale length plasmas encountered in indirect drive ICF applications. The one-way Helmholtz equation (OHE) generalizes the time-harmonic paraxial wave equation to large angles. Here, we present a methodology to numerically evaluate the exact solution to the OHE. This solution is computed by analytically advancing eigenfunctions of the one-way Helmholtz operator along a propagation direction and is applicable to any given index of a refraction profile. We compare our exact method with a commonly used approximate split-step technique for solving the OHE. As a test problem, we consider nonparaxial propagation of Gaussian and speckled beams in a plasma density channel with internal reflection. We find that the split-step approach incurs significant errors compared to the exact solution computed using the novel algorithm.