Lecture Notes in Mathematics Edited by A Dold and B Eckmann 1054 Vidar Thomée Galerkin Finite Element Methods for Parabolic Problems Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg New York Tokyo 1984Author Vidar Thomée Department of Mathematics ‘Chalmers University of Technology and the University of Goteborg '$-41296 - Goteborg, Sweden AMS Subject Classifications (1880): 65N30 ISBN 3.540-129114 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg New York Tokyo ISBN 0-387-129114 Springer-Verlag New York Heidelberg Berlin Tokyo “This works subject to copyright. All nghis are reserved, whether he whole or partf the matenal ieconcomed,epecteally those of barsiaton reprinting, reuse of ustetons, broadcasting. reprcduclion by photeopying machine or simi means snd sorage in data bak, User 1554 ol he Gorman Copyright Law where copies are made lor aler than private us oe 2 payable to “Verwertungsgeselschatt Wort”, Munch, {© by SpnngerVerlag Bein Heidelberg 1984 Prtedin Germany Prning and binding Bats Ofsetaruok Hemsbach/Bargst 246/340 549210,PREFACE ‘The purpose of this work is to present, an essentially self-contained form, ‘2 survey of che mathonatice of Galerkin finite elesent methods a6 applied to parabolic probleas. The selection of topics is not seant to be exhaustive, but rather reflects the author's involvenent in the field over the past ten years. The goal has been nainly pedagogical, with emphasis on collecting ideas and methods of analysis in simple node] situations, rather than on pursuing each approach to its Limits. The notes chus 1¢ recent developsents, and the reader is often referred to the Literature for ‘nore complete results on # given copie. Because the formation and analysis of Galer- kin wethods for parabolic problems are generally based oa facts concerning the corre: sponding stationary e1Lip fc problems, the necessary elliptic results are included in the text for completeness. The following is an outline of the contents of the notes: In the introductory Ghapter 1 we consider the simplest Galerkin finite eleneat ‘method for the standard initial boundary value problem with homogeneous Dirichlet boundary conditions on a bounded domain for the heat equation, using the standard ted weak formlation of the probles and enploying first piecewise Linear and thea more general piecewise polynomial approxinsting functions vanishing on the doundary of the domain. For this model problem we demonstrate the basic error esti- mates in energy and mean square norms, first for the somidiscrete probles resulting from discretization in the space variables only and then also for the most commonly used completely discrete schenes obtained by diseretizing the semidiserete equation with respect to the time variable. In the foltoving five chapears we consider several extensions and generalizations of these results in the cage of the semidiscrete approximation, and show error esti~ sates in a variety of norms. Hirst, in Chapter 2, ve express the semidiscrete problen by means of an approximate solution operator for the elliptic problem in manner