Proper orthogonal decomposition (POD) is apowerful technique for model reduction of non-linear systems. Itis based on a Galerkin type discretization with basis elementscreated from the dynamical system itself. In the context ofoptimal control this approach may suffer from the fact that thebasis elements are computed from a reference trajectory containingfeatures which are quite different from those of the optimallycontrolled trajectory. A method is proposed which avoids thisproblem of unmodelled dynamics in the proper orthogonaldecomposition approach to optimal control. It is referred to asoptimality system proper orthogonal decomposition (OS-POD).

In this paper we construct a model to describe someaspects of the deformation of the central region of the human lung considered as acontinuous elastically deformable medium. To achieve this purpose, we studythe interaction between the pipes composing the tree and the fluid that goes through it. We use a stationary model to determine the deformed radius of each branch. Then, we solve a constrained minimization problem, so as to minimize the viscous (dissipated) energy in the tree. The key feature of our approach is the useof a fixed point theorem in order to find the optimal flow associatedto a deformed tree. We also give some numerical results withinteresting consequences on human lung deformation during expiration, particularlyconcerning the localization of the equal pressure point (EPP).


A new finite element, which is continuously differentiable, but only piecewise quadratic polynomials on a type of uniform triangulations, is introduced. We construct a local basis which does not involve nodal values nor derivatives. Different from the traditional finite elements, we have to construct a special, averaging operator which is stable and preserves quadratic polynomials. We show the optimal order of approximation of the finite element in interpolation, and in solving the biharmonic equation. Numerical results are provided confirming the analysis.


It is well known that the classical local projection method as well as residual-based stabilization techniques, as for instancestreamline upwind Petrov-Galerkin (SUPG), are optimal on isotropicmeshes. Here we extend the local projection stabilization for the Navier-Stokes system to anisotropic quadrilateral meshes in two spatial dimensions. Wedescribe the new methodand prove an a priori error estimate. This method leads on anisotropic meshes to qualitatively better convergence behavior than other isotropicstabilization methods.The capability of the methodis illustrated by means of two numerical test problems.

This paper deals with the problem of numerical approximation in the Cauchy-Dirichlet problem for a scalar conservation law with a flux function having finitely many discontinuities. The well-posedness of this problem was proved by Carrillo [J. Evol. Eq. 3 (2003) 687–705]. Classical numerical methods do not allow us to compute a numerical solution (due to the lack of regularity of the flux). Therefore, we propose an implicit Finite Volume method based on an equivalent formulation of the initial problem. We show the well-posedness of the scheme and the convergence of the numerical solution to the entropy solution of the continuous problem. Numerical simulations are presented in the framework of Riemann problems related to discontinuous transport equation, discontinuous Burgers equation, discontinuous LWR equation and discontinuous non-autonomous Buckley-Leverett equation (lubrication theory).

In this paper we mathematically analyse an evolution variational inequality which formulates the double critical-state model for type-II superconductivity in 3D space and propose a finite element method to discretize the formulation. The double critical-state model originally proposed by Clem and Perez-Gonzalez is formulated as a model in 3D space which characterizes the nonlinear relation between the electric field, the electric current, the perpendicular component of the electric current to the magnetic flux, and the parallel component of the current to the magnetic flux in bulk type-II superconductor. The existence of a solution to the variational inequality formulation is proved and the representation theorem of subdifferential for a class of energy functionals including our energy is established. The variational inequality formulation is discretized in time by a semi-implicit scheme and in space by the edge finite element of lowest order on a tetrahedral mesh.The fully discrete formulation is an unconstrained optimisation problem.The subsequence convergence property of the fully discrete solution is proved. Some numerical results computed under a rotating applied magnetic field are presented.

We propose and analyze a semi Lagrangian method for the convection-diffusion equation. Error estimates for both semi and fully discrete finite element approximations are obtained for convection dominated flows. The estimates are posed in terms of the projections constructed in [Chrysafinos and Walkington, SIAM J. Numer. Anal. 43 (2006) 2478–2499; Chrysafinos and Walkington, SIAM J. Numer. Anal. 44 (2006) 349–366] and the dependence of various constants upon the diffusion parameter is characterized. Error estimates independent of the diffusion constant are obtained when the velocity field is computed exactly.

As a first draft of a model for a river flowing on a homogeneous porous ground, we consider a system where the Darcy and Stokes equations are coupled via appropriate matching conditions on the interface. We propose a discretization of this problem which combines the mortar method with standard finite elements, in order to handle separately the flow inside and outside the porous medium. We prove a priori and a posteriori error estimates for the resulting discrete problem. Some numerical experiments confirm the interest of the discretization.

We present a fully adaptive multiresolution scheme for spatially one-dimensional quasilinear strongly degenerate parabolic equations with zero-flux and periodic boundary conditions. The numerical scheme is based on a finite volume discretization using the Engquist-Osher numerical flux and explicit time stepping. An adaptive multiresolution scheme based on cell averages is then used to speed up the CPU time and the memory requirements of the underlying finite volume scheme, whose first-order version is known to converge to an entropy solution of the problem. A particular feature of the method is the storage of the multiresolution representation of the solution in a graded tree, whoseleaves are the non-uniform finite volumes on which the numerical divergence is eventually evaluated. Moreover using the L 1 contraction of the discrete time evolution operator we derive the optimal choice of the threshold in the adaptive multiresolution method. Numerical examples illustrate thecomputational efficiency together with the convergence properties.

We are concerned with a 2D time harmonic wave propagationproblem in a medium including a thin slot whose thickness εis small with respect to the wavelength. In a previous article, we derivedformally an asymptotic expansion of the solution with respect to εusing the method of matched asymptotic expansions. We also proved theexistence and uniqueness of the terms of the asymptotics. In this paper,we complete the mathematical justification of our work by deriving optimal error estimates between the exact solutions and truncated expansions at any order.

We propose a model for segmentation problemsinvolving an energy concentrated on the vertices of an unknownpolyhedral set, where the contours of the images to be recoveredhave preferred directions and focal points.We prove that such an energy is obtained as a Γ-limit offunctionals defined on sets with smooth boundary thatinvolve curvature terms of the boundary.The minimizers of the limit functional are polygons withedges either parallel to some prescribed directions or pointing to somefixed points, that can also be taken as unknown of the problem.

The Ultra Weak Variational Formulation (UWVF) of the Helmholtz equationprovides a variational framework suitable for discretization using plane wave solutionsof an appropriate adjoint equation. Currently convergence of the method is only proved on the boundary of the domain. However substantial computational evidence exists showing that the method also converges throughout the domain of the Helmholtz equation. In this paper we exploit the fact that the UWVF is essentially an upwind discontinuous Galerkin method to prove convergence of the solution in the special case where there is no absorbing medium present. We also provide some other estimates in the case when absorption is present, and give some simple numerical results to test the estimates. We expect that similar techniques can be used to prove error estimates for the UWVF applied to Maxwell's equations and elasticity.

We consider a system of degenerate parabolic equations modelling a thin film, consisting of two layers of immiscible Newtonian liquids, ona solid horizontal substrate. In addition, the model includes the presence of insoluble surfactants onboth the free liquid-liquid and liquid-air interfaces,and the presence of both attractive and repulsive van der Waals forcesin terms of the heights of the two layers. We show that this system formally satisfies a Lyapunov structure,and a second energy inequality controlling the Laplacianof the liquid heights.We introduce a fully practical finite element approximation of this nonlinear degenerate parabolic system, that satisfies discrete analoguesof these energy inequalities. Finally, we prove convergence of this approximation,and hence existence of a solutionto this nonlinear degenerate parabolic system.

We propose and analyze numerical schemes for viscosity solutions of time-dependent Hamilton-Jacobi equations on the Heisenberg group.The main idea is to construct a grid compatible with the noncommutative group geometry. Under suitable assumptions on the data, the Hamiltonian and the parameters for the discrete first order scheme,we prove that the error between the viscosity solution computed at the grid nodes and the solution of the discrete problem behaves like $\sqrt{h}$ where h is the mesh step. Such an estimate is similar to those available in the Euclidean geometrical setting.The theoretical results are tested numerically on some examples for which semi-analytical formulas for the computation of geodesics are known. Other simulations are presented, for both steady and unsteady problems.

The quasicontinuum method is a coarse-graining technique for reducing the complexity of atomistic simulations in a static and quasistatic setting. In this paper we aim to give a detailed a priori and a posteriori error analysis for a quasicontinuum method in one dimension. We consider atomistic models with Lennard–Jones type long-range interactions and a QC formulation which incorporates several important aspects of practical QC methods. First, we prove the existence, the local uniqueness and the stability with respect to a discrete W1,∞-norm of elastic and fractured atomistic solutions. We use a fixed point argument to prove the existence of a quasicontinuum approximation which satisfies a quasi-optimal a priori error bound. We then reverse the role of exact and approximate solution and prove that, if a computed quasicontinuum solution is stable in a sense that we make precise and has a sufficiently small residual, there exists a `nearby' exact solution which it approximates, and we give an a posteriori error bound. We stress that, despite the fact that we use linearization techniques in the analysis, our results apply to genuinely nonlinear situations.

In this paper, we consider C 1,1 Hamiltonian systems. We prove the existence of a first derivative of the flow with respect to initial values and show that it satisfies the symplecticity condition almost everywhere in the phase-space. In a second step, we present a geometric integrator for such systems (called the SDH method) based on B-splines interpolation and a splitting method introduced by McLachlan and Quispel [Appl. Numer. Math. 45 (2003) 411–418], and we prove it is convergent, and that it preserves the energy and the volume.

A class of compatible spatial discretizations for solving partial differential equations is presented. A discrete exact sequence framework is developed to classify these methods which include the mimetic and the covolume methods as well as certain low-order finite element methods. This construction ensures discrete analogs of the differential operators that satisfy the identities and theorems of vector calculus, in particular a Helmholtz decomposition theorem for the discrete function spaces. This paper demonstrates that these methods differ only in their choice of discrete inner product. Finally, certain uniqueness results for the covolume inner product are shown.

A standard method for proving the inf-sup condition implying stability of finite element approximations for the stationary Stokes equations is to construct a Fortin operator. In this paper, we show how this can be done for two-dimensional triangular and rectangular Taylor-Hood methods, which use continuous piecewise polynomial approximations for both velocity and pressure.

In this paper we introduce a new class of numerical schemes for the incompressible Navier-Stokes equations, which are inspired by the theory of discrete kinetic schemes for compressible fluids. For these approximations it is possible to give a stability condition, based on a discrete velocities version of the Boltzmann H-theorem. Numerical tests are performed to investigate their convergence and accuracy.

In this paper, the convergence of a Neumann-Dirichlet algorithm to approximateCoulomb's contact problem between two elastic bodies is proved in a continuous setting. In this algorithm, the natural interface between the two bodies is retained as a decomposition zone.