Numerical enclosure-methods for the weak solution of elliptic problems with unilateral constraints (Q1341104)

The authors propose a numerical method for computing enclosures for the solutions of elliptic boundary value problems with unilateral boundary conditions (boundary obstacle problems). For this purpose, the problem is written in variational form, and a penalty term is introduced to facilitate the analytical treatment. The solutions of the penalty problems are shown to converge to the solution of the given problem, and an explicit error bound is given. Next, the penalty problems are discretized by use of linear finite elements, and a bound for the discretization error is provided. Finally, enclosures for the solutions of the discretized problems are computed by means of interval analytical methods. Altogether one obtains, after adjusting the available parameters, an enclosure for the solution of the given problem.