Past exam of the fixed point methods for nonlinear partial differential equations course of the University of Oxford / 2008 / 2 / c / Solution

Work in the Banach space $C([0,1])$ with its supremum norm, and take the nonempty closed bounded convex set $M=\{u:100\le u(t)\le 121\text{ for all }t\}$. DefineFor $u\in M$ the absolute value is unnecessary, and $\boxed{101\le Tu(t)\le 101+12=113\le 121}$. Thus $T:M\to M$. Also, for $a,b\ge 100$,so $\Vert Tu-Tv{\Vert }_{\infty }\le \frac{1}{20}\Vert u-v{\Vert }_{\infty }$ and in particular $T$ is continuous.

The image is uniformly bounded, and $|Tu(t)-Tu(s)|\le 12|t-s|$, so it is equicontinuous. The Arzelà-Ascoli theorem says that a uniformly bounded equicontinuous family in $C([0,1])$ has relatively compact closure in the uniform norm. Hence $T$ is compact, and the Schauder fixed-point theorem supplies $\boxed{u=Tu}$, the required solution. In fact the displayed contraction estimate also lets the contraction mapping theorem give uniqueness within $M$ and convergence of the corresponding Picard iteration. The initial constant here is the printed integer $101$.