A penalty method for numerically handling dispersive equations with incompatible initial and boundary data

This article is the numerical counterpart of a theoretical work in progress Qin and Teman, Applicable Anal (2011), 1–19, related to the approximation of evolution hyperbolic equations with incompatible data. The Korteweg‐de Vries and Schrödinger equations with incompatible initial and boundary data are considered here. For hyperbolic equations, the lack of regularity (compatibility) is known to produce large numerical errors which propagate throughout the spatial domain, destroying convergence. In this article, we numerically test the effectiveness of the penalty‐based method proposed in Qin and Teman, Applicable Anal (2011), 1–19, which replaces the hyperbolic equations with incompatible data by a system with compatible data. We observe that convergence is increased. As explained in the text, in the case of the Schrödinger equation, the impact of incompatible (nonregular) data is most severe, and the authors are not aware of any other method that can handle such severe incompatible data. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Numer Methods Partial Differential Eq 2011     

The 3D Primitive Equations in the absence of viscosity: Boundary conditions and well-posedness in the linearized case

In this article we consider the 3D Primitive Equations (PEs) of the ocean, without viscosity and linearized around a stratified flow. As recalled in the Introduction, the PEs without viscosity ought to be supplemented with boundary conditions of a totally new type which must be nonlocal. In this article a set of boundary conditions is proposed for which we show that the linearized PEs are well-posed. The proposed boundary conditions are based on a suitable spectral decomposition of the unknown functions. Noteworthy is the rich structure of the Primitive Equations without viscosity. Our study is based on a modal decomposition in the vertical direction; in this decomposition, the first mode is essentially a (linearized) Euler flow, then a few modes correspond to a stationary problem partly elliptic and partly hyperbolic; finally all the other modes correspond to a stationary problem fully hyperbolic.     

A note on statistical solutions of the three-dimensional Navier–Stokes equations: The stationary case

Stationary statistical solutions of the three-dimensional Navier–Stokes equations for incompressible fluids are considered. They are a mathematical formalization of the notion of ensemble average for turbulent flows in statistical equilibrium in time. They are also a generalization of the notion of invariant measure to the case of the three-dimensional Navier–Stokes equations, for which a global uniqueness result is not known to exist and a semigroup may not be well-defined in the classical sense. The two classical definitions of stationary statistical solutions are considered and compared, one of them being a particular case of the other and possessing a number of useful properties. Furthermore, the so-called time-average stationary statistical solutions, obtained as generalized limits of time averages of weak solutions as the averaging time goes to infinity are shown to belong to this more restrictive class. A recurrent type result is also obtained for statistical solutions satisfying an accretion condition. Finally, the weak global attractor of the three-dimensional Navier–Stokes equations is considered, and in particular it is shown that there exists a topologically large subset of the weak global attractor which is of full measure with respect to that particular class of stationary statistical solutions and which has a certain regularity property.     

A co-area formula with applications to monotone rearrangement and to regularity

Communicated by G. Strang     

On the numerical approximations of stiff convection–diffusion equations in a circle

Our aim in this article is to study the numerical solutions of singularly perturbed convection–diffusion problems in a circular domain and provide as well approximation schemes, error estimates and numerical simulations. To resolve the oscillations of classical numerical solutions due to the stiffness of our problem, we construct, via boundary layer analysis, the so-called boundary layer elements which absorb the boundary layer singularities. Using a $P_1$ classical finite element space enriched with the boundary layer elements, we obtain an accurate numerical scheme in a quasi-uniform mesh.     

Local and Global Lyapunov exponents

Various properties of Local and Global Lyapunov exponents are related by redefining them as the spectral radii of some positive operators on a space of continuous functions and utilizing the theory developed by Choquet and Foias. These results are then applied to the problem of estimating the Hausdorff dimension of the global attractor and the existence of a critical trajectory, along which the Lyapunov dimension is majorized, is established. Using this new estimate, the existing dimension estimate for the global attractor of the Lorenz system is improved. Along the way a simple relation between topological entropy and the fractal dimension is obtained.     

Renormalization group method applied to the primitive equations

In this article we study the limit, as the Rossby number ε goes to zero, of the primitive equations of the atmosphere and the ocean. From the mathematical viewpoint we study the averaging of a penalization problem displaying oscillations generated by an antisymmetric operator and by the presence of two time scales.