Nonsmooth Schur-Newton Methods for Multicomponent Cahn-Hilliard Equations

Carsten Gräser^*

We consider large scale nonlinear saddle point problems as arising by discretization of multicomponent Cahn-Hilliard systems with logarithmic and obstacle potentials. Based on a dual minimization problem we introduce the nonsmooth Schur-Newton method for the efficient numerical solution of those problems. The method is globally convergent, mesh independent, and robust with respect to the number of components and the occurring nonlinearities.

Mathematics Subject Classification: 65K15

Keywords: phase field, nonsmooth Newton method, nonlinear Schur complement

Minisymposion: Nonsmooth Optimization