Numerical Methods Qualification Exam Problems and Solutions (University of Maryland)/Aug04 667

Problem 5a

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State Newton's method for the approximate solution of


 


where   is a real-valued function of the real variable  

Solution 5a

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Problem 5b

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State and prove a convergence result for the method.

Solution 5b

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Problem 5c

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What is the typical order of convergence? Are there situations in which the order of convergence is higher? Explain your answers to these questions.

Solution 5c

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The typical order of local convergence is quadratic.


Consider the Newton's method as a fixed point iteration i.e.:


 


Then


 


 


Expanding   around   gives an expression for the error


 


Note that if  , then we have better than quadratic convergence.

Problem 6

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Consider the boundary value problem

 


Problem 6a

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Derive a variational formulation for (1).

Solution 6a

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Find   such that for all  


 

Problem 6b

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What do we mean by Finite Element Approximation   to  

Solution 6b

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Let   be a partition of  . Choose a an appropriate discrete subspace   and basis functions  . Then


 


The coefficients   can be found by solving the following system of equations:


For  


 

Problem 6c

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State and prove an estimate for


 


Solution 6c

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Cea's Lemma:


 


In particular choose   to be the linear interpolant of  .


Then,


 


Alternative Solution 6c

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Let   be a discrete mesh of   with step size  . Consider the following integral

 .

For some  ,   as   is just a linear interpolation on this interval. Hence

 .

Similarly, we can bound the   norm of the error in the derivatives with  . With   such intervals we have

 

Problem 6d

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Prove the formula


 

Solution 6d

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Problem 7

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Consider the initial value problem


 


where   satisfies the Lipschitz condition


 


for all  . A numerical method called the midpoint rule for solving this problem is defined by


 


where   is a time step and   for  . Here   is given and   is presumed to be computed by some other method.

Problem 7a

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Suppose the problem is posed on a finite interval   where  . Show directly,i.e., without citing any major results, that the midpoint rule is stable. That is show that if   and   satisfy


 


then there exists a constant   independent of   such that


 


for  

Solution 7a

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Subtracting both equations, letting  , and applying the Lipschitz property yields,


 


Therefore,


 

Problem 7b

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Suppose instead we are interested in the long term behavior of the midpoint rule applied to a particular example  . That is, let   be fixed and let   so that the rule is applied over a long time interval. Show that in this case the midpoint rule does not produce an accurate approximation to the solution to the initial value problem.

Solution 7b

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Substituting into the midpoint rule we have,


 


or


 


The solution of this equation is given by


 


where   or the roots of the quadratic


 


The quadratic formula yields


 


If   is a small negative number, than one of the roots will be greater than 1. Hence,   as   instead of converging to zero since  .