Numerical Methods for PDEs

(CS 555 / CSE 510 / MATH 552)

Spring 2011

Tu-Th 12:30 - 1:45
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Department of Computer Science

Instructor : Anil N. Hirani

The lectures before spring break will be on finite element methods (FEM) for PDEs and on iterative methods for solving large linear systems arising from discretizations of numerical PDEs. The lectures after spring break will be on finite difference (FD) methods for PDEs. We will only study linear PDEs and use Python programming language with some additional modules (details in class). No prior experience with Python is required. Most lectures will be on theory and some on programming.

Books: The Mathematical Theory of Finite Element Methods by Brenner and Scott; Finite Element Methods and Their Applications by Zhangxin Chen (available online for free from any campus IP address via the library); and Finite Difference Schemes and Partial Differential Equations by Strikwerda (cheaper if you become a SIAM member which is free for students).

Policies: Do NOT post, email or upload class material. This includes copies of lectures, homeworks, solutions, handouts, and code provided by us.

Collaboration: You should collaborate on homeworks. That's a good way to learn. But you must write up the solutions on your own and write your own code.

Newsgroup: Announcements will be made in class and sometimes on the CS newsgroup class.sp11.cs555 (follow link for instructions to configure a newsreader or web access). The newsgroup can also be used by students for asking questions and discussions. But giving away the solution (including posting code snippets) on the newsgroup will be considered cheating.

subversion (svn): We will use a class subversion (svn) repository for all handouts and code submissions. This handout should help you get started with using svn. The course repository URL is https://subversion.ews.illinois.edu/svn/sp11-cs555.

Homeworks: Some homeworks will be mathematical, and some will involve Python programming. You may submit handwritten solutions, but all code must be submitted via svn.

Software: Needed software has been installed on all EWS labs. You may also install on your personal machine. Details in class.

Course Staff: Prof. Anil N. Hirani, hirani at cs dot illinois dot edu ; 217-333-2727; Room 4320 Siebel Center. Kaushik Kalyanaraman, kalyana1 at illinois dot edu ; 217-244-0941; Room 4330 Siebel Center; Office hours : Wed 1.00 pm to 2.00 pm and by appointment.

Page maintained by Anil N. Hirani and Kaushik Kalyanaraman Last modified: Tue Feb 1 16:47:50 CST 2011