An a posteriori error estimate for a linear-nonlinear transmission problem in plane elastostatics

Mauricio A. Barrientos, Gabriel N. Gatica and Norbert Heuer
Calcolo 39, 61-86, 2002.

We consider the coupling of dual-mixed finite element and boundary element methods to solve a linear-nonlinear transmission problem in plane hyperelasticity with mixed boundary conditions. Besides the displacement and the stress tensor, we introduce the strain tensor as an additional unknown, which yields a two-fold saddle point operator equation as the corresponding variational formulation. We derive a reliable a-posteriori error estimate that depends on the solution of local Dirichlet problems and on residual terms on the transmission and Neumann boundaries, which are given in a negative order Sobolev norm. Our approach does not need the exact Galerkin solution, but any reasonable approximation of it. In addition, the analysis does not depend on special finite element or boundary element subspaces. However, for certain specific subspaces we are able to provide two fully local a-posteriori error estimates, in which the residual terms are bounded by weighted local $L^2$-norms. Further, one of the error estimates does not require the explicit solution of the local problems.