A note on interpolation, best approximation, and the saturation property (Q495533)

Let \(\Omega\) be a domain in a space of arbitrarily many dimensions and \(\mathcal T\) a simplicial triangulation of \(\Omega\), having the elements shape regular. Associated with \(\mathcal T\) one considers the piecewise polynomial finite element spaces \(\mathcal S_p\) and \(\mathcal S_{2p}\) of polynomials of degree \(p\) and \(2p\), respectively. The authors consider the functions \(u\) in the Sobolev space \(W^1_r(\Omega)\), \(r\geq 1\), such that there is a constant \(\beta=\beta(u)\geq 0\) satisfying the inequality \[ |u-\mathcal I_{2p}u|_{1,r}\leq \beta |u-\mathcal I_pu|_{1,r}\tag{\(*\)} \] (called saturation property). Here, \(|\cdot|_{1,r}\) is the \(W^1_r\)-seminorm and \(\mathcal I_p\), \(\mathcal I_{2p}\) are interpolation operators with values in \(S_p,\, S_{2p}\), respectively, such that the set of nodes of \(\mathcal I_p\) is contained in the set of nodes of \(\mathcal I_{2p}\). It follows that the best approximation error \(|u-\chi|_{1,r}\), \(\chi\in S_p\), can be estimated by the best approximation error. The authors first prove that there is a constant \(\theta=\theta(p)>0\) such that \(|\mathcal I_pv|_{1,r}\leq \theta |v|_{1,r}\) for all \(v\in S_{2p}\). The main result of the paper is the following one: Assume that \(u\in W^1_r(\Omega)\) is continuous and satisfies the saturation property \((*)\) with a constant \(\beta=\beta(u)<1/\theta\). Then \[ |u-\mathcal I_pu|_{1,r}\leq \frac{1+\theta}{1-\theta p}\cdot |u-\chi|_{1,r}\,, \] for all \(\chi\in S_{2p}\). An application of these results to a posteriori estimation for elliptic boundary value problems is considered.