Multi-dimensional cosmological radiative transfer with a Variable Eddington Tensor formalism

We present a new approach to numerically model continuum radiative transfer based on the Optically Thin Variable Eddington Tensor (OTVET) approximation. Our method insures the exact conservation of the photon number and flux (in the explicit formulation) and automatically switches from the optically thick to the optically thin regime. It scales as N log N with the number of hydrodynamic resolution elements and is independent of the number of sources of ionizing radiation (i.e. works equally fast for an arbitrary source function). We also describe an implementation of the algorithm in a Soften Lagrangian Hydrodynamic code (SLH) and a multi-frequency approach appropriate for hydrogen and helium continuum opacities. We present extensive tests of our method for single and multiple sources in homogeneous and inhomogeneous density distributions, as well as a realistic simulation of cosmological reionization. (C) 2001 Published by Elsevier Science B.V.