Residual type a posteriori error estimates for semi-linear parabolic partial differential equations

Abstract

A posteriori error analysis is the key idea for adaptive finite element methods for solving partial differential equations(PDEs). In this thesis, we are interested in a posteriori error analysis for semi-linear parabolic PDEs over polygonal domain in 2-D with Dirichlet boundary condition. We showed the efficiency and reliability of a posteriori error estimator by deriving the upper and local lower bounds based on the standard residual estimator under the assumption that the nonlinear function f is Lipschitz with respect to the variable u. We also constructed an algorithm for adaptive finite element method based on a posterior error estimations.