A fourth-order finite difference scheme for two-dimensional nonlinear elliptic partial differential equations

A finite difference scheme for the two-dimensional, second-order, nonlinear elliptic equation is developed. The difference scheme is derived using the local solution of the differential equation. A 13-point stencil on a uniform mesh of size h is used to derive the finite difference scheme, which has a truncation error of order h⁴. Well-known iterative methods can be employed to solve the resulting system of equations. Numerical results are presented to demonstrate the fourth-order convergence of the scheme. © 1995 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.