English

Discrete Gradient Flow Approximations of High Dimensional Evolution Partial Differential Equations via Deep Neural Networks

Numerical Analysis 2022-06-02 v1 Numerical Analysis

Abstract

We consider the approximation of initial/boundary value problems involving, possibly high-dimensional, dissipative evolution partial differential equations (PDEs) using a deep neural network framework. More specifically, we first propose discrete gradient flow approximations based on non-standard Dirichlet energies for problems involving essential boundary conditions posed on bounded spatial domains. The imposition of the boundary conditions is realized weakly via non-standard functionals; the latter classically arise in the construction of Galerkin-type numerical methods and are often referred to as "Nitsche-type" methods. Moreover, inspired by the seminal work of Jordan, Kinderleher, and Otto (JKO) \cite{jko}, we consider the second class of discrete gradient flows for special classes of dissipative evolution PDE problems with non-essential boundary conditions. These JKO-type gradient flows are solved via deep neural network approximations. A key, distinct aspect of the proposed methods is that the discretization is constructed via a sequence of residual-type deep neural networks (DNN) corresponding to implicit time-stepping. As a result, a DNN represents the PDE problem solution at each time node. This approach offers several advantages in the training of each DNN. We present a series of numerical experiments which showcase the good performance of Dirichlet-type energy approximations for lower space dimensions and the excellent performance of the JKO-type energies for higher spatial dimensions.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2206.00290,
  title  = {Discrete Gradient Flow Approximations of High Dimensional Evolution Partial Differential Equations via Deep Neural Networks},
  author = {Emmanuil H. Georgoulis and Michail Loulakis and Asterios Tsiourvas},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2206.00290},
  year   = {2022}
}
R2 v1 2026-06-24T11:35:35.847Z