Analysis of two parareal algorithms for time-periodic problems

The parareal algorithm, which permits us to solve evolution problems in a time parallel fashion, has created a lot of attention over the past decade. The algorithm has its roots in the multiple shooting method for boundary value problems, which in the parareal algorithm is applied to initial value problems, with a particular coarse approximation of the Jacobian matrix. It is therefore of interest to formulate parareal-type algorithms for time-periodic problems, which also couple the end of the time interval with the beginning, and to analyze their performance in this context. We present and analyze two parareal algorithms for time-periodic problems: one with a periodic coarse problem and one with a nonperiodic coarse problem. An interesting advantage of the algorithm with the nonperiodic coarse problem is that no time-periodic problems need to be solved during the iteration, since on the time subdomains, the problems are not time-periodic either. We prove for both linear and nonlinear problems convergence of the new algorithms, with linear bounds on the convergence. We also extend these results to evolution partial differential equations using Fourier techniques. We illustrate our analysis with numerical experiments, both for model problems and the realistic application of a nonlinear cooled reverse-flow reactor system of partial differential equations.