Petviashvilli's method for the Dirichlet problem (Q283312)

The authors are concerned with the Petviashvilli's method in solving a Dirichlet problem attached to a genuinely nonlinear elliptic problem defined on a finite domain with sufficiently smooth boundary. The nonlinearity is superlinear and subcritical. The problem could come when one searches exact nonlinear bound state solutions corresponding to the nonlinear Schrödinger equation or the nonlinear wave equation. However, the problem must be reformulated on a finite domain, and an artificial boundary condition must be introduced. First, the authors review some preliminary results on the existence and regularity of nonlinear bound states, the well-posedness of the iteration scheme, and important spectral properties of the iteration operator. Then they prove a strong local convergence result as well as a subsequential global convergence one, the latter being a novelty. As their numerical experiments show that the Petviashvilli's algorithm appears to always produce a ground state solution, the authors try to provide some insight into this behavior. Some numerical examples are carried out. They analyze the influence on the algorithm of the starting guess and consider 2D examples with or without radial symmetry.