Well-posedness, energy and charge conservation for nonlinear wave equations in discrete space-time

Abstract

We consider the problem of discretization for the U(1)-invariant nonlinear wave equations in any dimension. We show that the classical finite-difference scheme used by Strauss and Vazquez \cite{MR0503140} conserves the positive-definite discrete analog of the energy if the grid ratio is $dt/dx\le 1/\sqrt{n}$, where $dt$ and $dx$ are the mesh sizes of the time and space variables and $n$ is the spatial dimension. We also show that if the grid ratio is $dt/dx=1/\sqrt{n}$, then there is the discrete analog of the charge which is conserved. We prove the existence and uniqueness of solutions to the discrete Cauchy problem. We use the energy conservation to obtain the a priori bounds for finite energy solutions, thus showing that the Strauss -- Vazquez finite-difference scheme for the nonlinear Klein-Gordon equation with positive nonlinear term in the Hamiltonian is conditionally stable.