Improved ZZ a posteriori error estimators for diffusion problems: discontinuous elements (Q2227661)

The purpose of the paper is to extend the Zienkiewicz-Zhu (ZZ) a posteriori error estimator [\textit{Z. Cai} et al., Comput. Methods Appl. Mech. Eng. 313, 433--449 (2017; Zbl 1439.65153)] for conforming linear finite elements to discontinuous linear finite element approximations including both nonconforming and discontinuous elements for diffusion problems. The approach is based on the construction of a gradient in the \(H(\mathrm{curl})\) conforming subspace of either the piecewise constant or the higher-order vector spaces for the diffusion problem with both scaler and full tensor diffusion coefficient. These spaces are chosen as the \(H(\mathrm{curl})\) conforming first and second types of Nédélec spaces. The improved ZZ estimators consist of two parts measuring the conforming and nonconforming errors with the recovered gradients and fluxes. The error estimators are analyzed by establishing their global reliability and local efficiency bounds. The resulting error estimators are efficient and reliable with constants independent of the jump of the coefficient regardless of its distribution. Numerical results for the Kellogg test problem and an L-shape Poisson problem verify the theoretical results.