Krylov Subspace Methods and Preconditioning

Academic year 2025/2026
Lecturer Michele Benzi

Examination procedure

<p>Seminar talk</p>

Examination procedure notes

<p>The student will be asked to present the results of a project to be chosen together with the instructor.</p>

Prerequisites

Excellent knowledge of linear algebra and familiarity with the basics of numerical computing and scientific programming, for example in MATLAB, Python, or Julia.

The course is suitable for PhD students (I-II year) and for Master's students with previous exposure to numerical analysis. The course should be of interest also

to PhD student in Chemistry and Physics.

Syllabus

Introductory remarks

Krylov subspaces

Projection methods

The Lanczos and Arnoldi methods

The conjugate gradient method

Elements of approximation theory

Chebyshev and Faber polynomials

The Full Orthogonalization Method (FOM)

Minimum residual methods (MinRes, GMRES)

Hybrid methods (briefly)

Convergence analysis

The Faber-Manteuffel Theorem (statement only)

Preconditioning techniques (ILU, SPAI, AINV, AMG, etc.)

Rational Krylov methods

Krylov methods for computing eigenvalues and functions of matrices

Bibliographical references

Y. Saad, Iterative Methods for Sparse Linear Systems, SIAM, Philadelphia, 2003.


Additional references will be provided in class.