Energy conserving Lagrangian approximation for the equations of Navier- Stokes (Q1122060)

We consider the nonstationary nonlinear Navier-Stokes equations describing the motion of a viscous incompressible fluid in a cylindrical domain (0,T)\(\times \Omega\), where \(T>0\) and \(\Omega \subset {\mathbb{R}}^ 3\) is smoothly bounded. Constructing a new Lagrangian difference quotient we can approximate the nonlinear convective term of these equations without loosing the conservation of energy. Using an additional time delay it is possible to determine the trajectories of the fluid particles from the velocity field and vice versa successively, such that the resulting modified equations can be solved globally in time. A special construction of compatible initial data implies that the corresponding solution is uniquely determined and strongly \(W^{m,2}(\Omega)\)- continuous uniformly in time (m\(\in \{3,4\})\). Here \(W^{m,2}(\Omega)\) is the Sobolev space of functions having generalized derivatives in \(L^ 2(\Omega)\) up to the order m. Passing to the limit for the Lagrangian difference quotient we show that there always exists a subsequence of the solutions, which globally in time converges against a weak solution of the original Navier-Stokes equations.