Approximation by solutions of elliptic equations in semilocal spaces

Abstract

In the present work, we investigate the approximability of solutions of elliptic partial differential equations in a bounded domain Ω by solutions of the same equations in a larger domain. We construct an abstract framework which allows us to deal with such density questions, simultaneously for various norms. More specifically, we study approximations with respect to the norms of semilocal Banach spaces of distributions. These spaces are required to satisfy certain postulates. We establish density results for elliptic operators with constant coefficients which unify and extend previous results. In our density results Ω may possess holes and it is required to satisfy the segment condition. We observe that analogous density results do not hold in spaces where the infinitely smooth functions are not dense. Finally, we provide applications related to the method of fundamental solutions. © 2008 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.