Unique weak solution to the biharmonic equation

Question

I am attempting to solve some problems from Evans, I need some help with the following question.

Suppose $u\in H^2_0(\Omega)$, where $\Omega$ is open, bounded subset of $\mathbb{R}^n$.

• How can I solve the biharmonic equation $$\begin{cases} \Delta^2u=f \quad\text{in } \Omega, \\ u =\frac {\partial u } {\partial n }=0\quad \text{on }\partial\Omega. \end{cases} $$ where $n$ is the normal vector such that $\int _\Omega \Delta u \Delta v \, \,dx =\int _\Omega fv $ for all $v\in H^2_0(\Omega)$.

• Given $f \in L^2(\Omega)$ , and prove that the weak solution is unique.

Any kind of help would be great.

Answer 1

I have some ideas about the first question.You can use the method that we find the solution of the Possion's Equation.

First, you can find a spherical symmetry solution of the biharmonic equation. Thus, you will get a fundamental solution. Then you can get solution of $\Delta^2u=f$ by Green's Identity.

Answer 2

Four hints:

i) what kind of functional is $v\mapsto \int fv$? It's obviously linear, but is it continuous?

ii) Assume $u,\bar{u}$ solve the problem. Then $\int\Delta(u-\bar{u})\Delta v dx =0$ for all admissible $v$. What is the image of $\Delta$ when applied to admissible $v$? I.e. for which $\phi$ can you solve $\Delta v = \phi$? All these $\phi$ are admissible test functions. What does that tell you about $u-\bar{u}$?

iii) What does ii) tell you about $(u,v)\mapsto \langle u, v\rangle := \int\Delta u \Delta v dx$ ? Could this possibly be a scalar product? If yes, on which space?

iv) Now try to combine i) and iii). Does any representation theorem for linear functionals apply?

This comes without any kind of warranty, I do explicitly state that I did not check the details, it's just the roadmap I'd try first (with quite some confidence, I'd like to add, though). But you asked for assistance not for a solution :-)

Answer 3

The Lax-Milgram theorem

Given a Hilbert space $V$ with scalar product $(.,.)_V$ and corresponding norm $\|\cdot\|_V$, a continuous and coercive bilinear form $a(.,.)$ on $V \times V$ and a continuous linear functional $L$ on $V,$ there exists unique $u \in V$ s.t.

$a(u,v) = L(v)\ \ \ \ \forall v \in V.$

Some of the proofs required if you want to use this:

• $a(.,.)$ is symmetric, ie, it holds that $a(u,v) = a(v,u) \ \ \ \forall u,v \in V$
• $a(.,.)$ is continuous, ie, there exists a constant $C>0$ s.t. $|a(u,v)|\leq C\|u\|_V\|v\|_V \ \ \forall u,v \in V $
• $a(.,.)$ is coercive or V-elliptic, ie, there exists a constant $\alpha>0$ s.t. $a(u,u) \geq \alpha \|u\|^2_V \ \ \ \forall u \in V$
• $L$ is continuous, ie, there exists a constant $\Lambda>0$ s.t. $|L(v)| \leq \lambda \|v\|_V \ \ \ \forall v \in V$

I hope this gets you started.