Volume 41, Issue 4 e70020
RESEARCH ARTICLE

A Partition of Unity Method for a Fourth-Order Variational Inequality of the Second Kind

Christopher Bard Davis

Corresponding Author

Christopher Bard Davis

Department of Mathematics, Tennessee Technological University, Cookeville, Tennessee, USA

Correspondence: Christopher Bard Davis ([email protected])

Search for more papers by this author
Yi Zhang

Yi Zhang

Department of Mathematics & Statistics, University of North Carolina at Greensboro, Greensboro, North Carolina, USA

Search for more papers by this author
First published: 16 July 2025
Funding: This work was partially supported by the National Science Foundation (Grant No. DMS-2111004).

ABSTRACT

In this work, we consider the use of a flat-top partition of unity method to solve a class of fourth-order variational inequalities of the second kind. Under the assumption that the solution is H 3 ( Ω ) $$ {H}^3\left(\Omega \right) $$ regular, optimal error estimates are made in the energy norm. Numerical examples are given to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method.

Data Availability Statement

The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

The full text of this article hosted at iucr.org is unavailable due to technical difficulties.