The chebop system for automatic solution of differential equations

• DOI: 10.1007/s10543-008-0198-4
• Publication Date: 2008-11-21T15:49:35Z
• Authors: Tobin A. Driscoll; Folkmar Bornemann; Lloyd N. Trefethen
• Keywords: Eigenfunction; Operator (biology)

In Matlab, it would be good to be able to solve a linear differential equation by typing u = L\f, where f, u, and L are representations of the right-hand side, the solution, and the differential operator with boundary conditions. Similarly it would be good to be able to exponentiate an operator with expm(L) or determine eigenvalues and eigenfunctions with eigs(L). A system is described in which such calculations are indeed possible, at least in one space dimension, based on the previously developed chebfun system in object-oriented Matlab. The algorithms involved amount to spectral collocation methods on Chebyshev grids of automatically determined resolution.