On unbounded operators and applications (Q2483146)

A solvable linear equation \(Au=f\) is considered. Here, \(A\) is a linear closed densely defined unbounded operator in a Hilbert space \(H\), which is not boundedly invertible, so that the problem under consideration is ill-posed. It is proved that the closure of the operator \((A^*A+ \alpha I)^{-1} A^*\), where \(\alpha > 0\) is a constant, is a linear bounded operator and \( \| A \| \leq \frac{1}{2\alpha}\). That result is applied to the variational problem to minimize the functional \(F(u)= \| Au-f \|^2 + \alpha \| u \|^2\), where \(f \in H\) is an arbitrary element, not necessarily belonging to the range of \(A\). This variational problem is used to construct a stable approximate solution of the original problem. The discrepancy principle, applied for choosing the regularization parameter in the case of an unbounded operator \(A\), is proved. The results of the present work improve previous results on regularization of unbounded operators, which used variational regularization with stabilizing functionals under some compactness properties [see, for example, \textit{V.\,Ivanov, V.\,Vasin} and \textit{V.\,Tanana}, ``Theory of Linear ill-posed problems'' (in Russian) (Akademiya Nauk SSSR, Ural'skij Nauchnyj Tsentr; Institut Matematiki i Mekhaniki.\ Moskva: Nauka) (1978; Zbl 0489.65035); \textit{O.\,Liskovetz}, Differ.\ Equations 6(1970), 972--976 (1973; Zbl 0257.47013)].