Determining surface heat flux in the steady state for the Cauchy problem for the Laplace equation

In this paper, we consider the Cauchy problem for the Laplace equation, in a strip where the Cauchy data is given at x = 0 and the flux is sought in the interval 0<x?1. This problem is typical ill-posed: the solution (if it exists) does not depend continuously on the data. We study a modification of the equation, where a fourth-order mixed derivative term is added. Some error stability estimates for the flux are given, which show that the solution of the modified equation is approximate to the solution of the Cauchy problem for the Laplace equation. Furthermore, numerical examples show that the modified method works effectively.