Consistency Analysis of Finite Difference Approximations to PDE Systems

Abstract: In the given paper we consider finite difference approximations to systems of polynomially-nonlinear partial differential equations whose coefficients are rational functions over rationals in the independent variables. The notion of strong consistency which we introduced earlier for linear systems is extended to nonlinear ones. For orthogonal and uniform grids we describe an algorithmic procedure for verification of strong consistency based on computation of difference standard bases. The concepts and algorithmic methods of the present paper are illustrated by two finite difference approximations to the two-dimensional Navier-Stokes equations. One of these approximations is strongly consistent and another is not.