  A new domain decomposition method is introduced for the heterogeneous 2-D and
3-D Helmholtz equations. Transmission conditions based on the perfectly matched
layer (PML) are derived that avoid artificial reflections and match incoming
and outgoing waves at the subdomain interfaces. We focus on a subdivision of
the rectangular domain into many thin subdomains along one of the axes, in
combination with a certain ordering for solving the subdomain problems and a
GMRES outer iteration. When combined with multifrontal methods, the solver has
near-linear cost in examples, due to very small iteration numbers that are
essentially independent of problem size and number of subdomains. It is to our
knowledge only the second method with this property next to the moving PML
sweeping method.
