An analysis of finite element locking in a parameter dependent model problem (Q5952129)

The authors consider the bilinear finite element approximation of smooth solutions to a simple parameter dependent elliptic model problem, the problem of highly anisotropic heat conduction [see \textit{I. Babuska} and \textit{M. Suri}, SIAM J. Numer. Anal. 29, No. 5, 1261-1293 (1992; Zbl 0763.65085)]. In solving parametric elliptic problems with the finite element method, there may arise the phenomenon of locking. The authors show that under favourable circumstances that depend on both the finite element mesh and on the type of boundary conditions, the effect of parametric locking of the standard finite element method can be reduced by a simple variational crime. The error is split in two orthogonal components, the approximation error and the consistency error and different bounds for these separate components are obtained. Some numerical results are also presented.