First characterization of a new method for numerically solving the Dirichlet problem of the two-dimensional electrical impedance equation (Q364407)

The paper deals with the Dirichlet problem for the two-dimensional impedance equation \(\text{div}(\sigma\;\text{grad}\, u)=0\). The main idea is to use the pseudoanalytic function theory for constructing an efficient numerical scheme for solving the problem. The scheme is based on using a complete orthonormal system (for approximating the Dirichlet boundary data) constructed in terms of the so-called formal powers. The emphasis in the paper is made on testing the numerical scheme in the case when the conductivity \(\sigma\) is not of a separable variables form. The numerical results are presented for several cases where the domain is a disk and the Dirichlet data correspond to explicitly given \(\sigma(x,y)\) and the associated \(u(x,y)\), which allows estimating the computational error. It is claimed that the proposed approach can be useful in solving the corresponding inverse problem, which is the electrical impedance tomography problem.