this paper is to highlight some of the underlying driving analytical mechanisms. The price of a powerful tool is the effort to construct and understand it. Its successful application hinges on the realization of a number of requirements. Some space has to be reserved for a clear identification of these requirements as well as for their realization. This is also particularly important for understanding the severe obstructions, that keep us at present from readily materializing all the principally promising perspectives.

. We consider two level overlapping Schwarz domain decomposition methods for solving the finite element problems that arise from discretizations of elliptic problems on general unstructured meshes in two and three dimensions. Standard finite element interpolation from the coarse to the fine grid may be used. Our theory requires no assumption on the substructures which constitute the whole domain, so each substructure can be of arbitrary shape and of different size. The global coarse mesh is allowed to be non-nested to the fine grid on which the discrete problem is to be solved and both the coarse meshes and the fine meshes need not be quasi-uniform. In addition, the domains defined by the fine and coarse grid need not be identical. The one important constraint is that the closure of the coarse grid must cover any portion of the fine grid boundary for which Neumann boundary conditions are given. In this general setting, our algorithms have the same optimal convergence rate of the usual ...

Abstract. We propose a substructuring preconditioner for solving threedimensional elliptic equations with strongly discontinuous coefficients. The new preconditioner can be viewed as a variant of the classical substructuring preconditioner proposed by Bramble, Pasiack and Schatz (1989), but with much simpler coarse solvers. Though the condition number of the preconditioned system may not have a good bound, we are able to show that the convergence rate of the PCG method with such substructuring preconditioner is nearly optimal, and also robust with respect to the (possibly large) jumps of the coefficient in the elliptic equation. 1.

Weighted max-norm bounds are obtained for Algebraic Additive Schwarz Iterations with overlapping blocks for the solution of Ax = b, when the coefficient matrix A is an M-matrix. The case of inexact local solvers is also covered. These bounds are analogous to those that exist using A-norms when the matrix A is symmetric positive definite. A new theorem concerning P -regular splittings is presented, which provides a useful tool for the A-norm bounds. Furthermore, a theory of splittings is developed to represent Algebraic Additive Schwarz Iterations. This representation makes a connection with multisplitting methods. With this representation, and using a comparison theorem, it is shown that a coarse grid correction improves the convergence of Additive Schwarz Iterations when measured in weighted max norm.

. The purpose of this paper is to give a unified investigation of a class of nonoverlapping domain decomposition methods for solving second-order elliptic problems in two and three dimensions. The methods under scrutiny fall into two major categories: the substructuring--type methods and the Neumann--Neumann-type methods. The basic framework used for analysis is the parallel subspace correction method or additive Schwarz method, and other technical tools include local-global and global-local techniques. The analyses for both two- and three-dimensional cases are carried out simultaneously. Some internal relationships between various algorithms are observed and several new variants of the algorithms are also derived. Key words. nonoverlapping domain decomposition, Schur complement, local-global and globallocal techniques, jumps in coe#cients, substructuring, Neumann--Neumann, balancing methods AMS subject classifications. 65N30, 65N55, 65F10 PII. S0036144596306800 1. Introduction. T...

This paper is the second part of a work on stabilizing the classical hierarchical basis HB by using wavelet-like basis functions. Implementation techniques are of major concern for the multilevel preconditioners proposed by the authors in the first part of the work, which deals with algorithms and their mathematical theory. Numerical results are presented to confirm the theory established there. A comparison of the performance of a number of multilevel methods is conducted for elliptic problems of three space variables. Key words. hierarchical basis, multilevel methods, preconditioning, finite element elliptic equations, approximate wavelets AMS subject classifications. 65F10, 65N20, 65N30 PII. S1064827596300668 1.

The convergence of multiplicative Schwarz-type methods for solving linear systems when the coefficient matrix is either a nonsingular M-matrix or a symmetric positive definite matrix is studied using classical and new results from the theory of splittings. The effect on convergence of algorithmic parameters such as the number of subdomains, the amount of overlap, the result of inexact local solves and of “coarse grid” corrections (global coarse solves) is analyzed in an algebraic setting. Results on algebraic additive Schwarz are also included.

A survey of two approaches for stabilizing the hierarchical basis (HB) multilevel preconditioners, both additive and multiplicative, is presented. The first approach is based on the algebraic extension of the two-level methods, exploiting recursive calls to coarser discretization levels. These recursive calls can be viewed as inner iterations (at a given discretization level), exploiting the already defined preconditioner at coarser levels in a polynomially-based inner iteration method. The latter gives rise to hybrid-type multilevel cycles. This is the so-called (hybrid) algebraic multilevel iteration (AMLI) method. The second approach is based on a different direct multilevel splitting of the finite element discretization space. This gives rise to the so-called wavelet multilevel decomposition based on L 2 -projections, which in practice must be approximated. Both approaches---the AMLI one and the one based on approximate wavelet decompositions---lead to optimal relative condition numbers of the multilevel preconditioners.

In this article, we examine the Bramble-Pasciak-Xu (BPX) preconditioner in the setting of local 2D and 3D mesh refinement. While the available optimality results for the BPX preconditioner have been constructed primarily in the setting of uniformly refined meshes, a notable exception is the 2D result due to Dahmen and Kunoth, which established BPX optimality on meshes produced by a restricted class of local 2D red-green refinement. The purpose of this article is to extend the original 2D Dahmen-Kunoth result to several additional types of local 2D and 3D red-green (conforming) and red (non-conforming) refinement procedures. The extensions are accomplished through a 3D extension of the 2D framework in the original Dahmen-Kunoth work, by which the question of optimality is reduced to establishing that locally enriched finite element subspaces allow for the construction of a scaled basis which is formally Riesz stable. This construction in turn rests entirely on establishing a number of geometrical properties between neighboring simplices produced by the local refinement algorithms. These properties are then used to build Riesz-stable scaled bases for use in the BPX optimality framework. Since the theoretical framework supports arbitrary spatial dimension d 1, we indicate clearly which geometrical properties, established here for several 2D and 3D local refinement procedures, must be re-established to show BPX optimality for spatial dimension 4. Finally, we also present a simple alternative optimality proof of the BPX preconditioner on quasiuniform meshes in two and three spatial dimensions, through the use of K-functionals and H stability of L 2 -projection for s 1. The proof techniques we use are quite general; in particular, the results require no smoothnes...

A general space decomposition technique is used to solve nonlinear convex minimization problems. The dierential of the minimization functional is required to satisfy some growth conditions that are weaker than Lipschitz continuity and strong monotonicity. Optimal rate of convergence is proved. If the dierential is Lipschitz continuous and strongly monotone, then the algorithms have uniform rate of convergence. The algorithms can be used for domain decomposition and multigrid type of techniques. Applications to linear elliptic and some nonlinear degenerated partial dierential equation are considered. 1 Introduction Domain decomposition and multigrid methods have been intensively studied for linear partial dierential equations. Recent research, see for example [32], reveals that domain decomposition and multigrid methods can be analysed using a same framework, see also [3], [13], [23], [17]. The present work uses this framework to analyse the convergence of two algorithms for convex...