Regularity and numerical approximation of fractional elliptic differential equations on compact metric graphs.

The fractional differential equation L^\beta u = f posed on a compact metric graph is considered, where \beta >0 and L = \kappa ^2 - \nabla (a\nabla) is a second-order elliptic operator equipped with certain vertex conditions and sufficiently smooth and positive coefficients \kappa,a. We demonstrate the existence of a unique solution for a general class of vertex conditions and derive the regularity of the solution in the specific case of Kirchhoff vertex conditions. These results are extended to the stochastic setting when f is replaced by Gaussian white noise. For the deterministic and stochastic settings under generalized Kirchhoff vertex conditions, we propose a numerical solution based on a finite element approximation combined with a rational approximation of the fractional power L^{-\beta }. For the resulting approximation, the strong error is analyzed in the deterministic case, and the strong mean squared error as well as the L_2(\Gamma \times \Gamma)-error of the covariance function of the solution are analyzed in the stochastic setting. Explicit rates of convergences are derived for all cases. Numerical experiments for {L = \kappa ^2 - \Delta, \kappa >0} are performed to illustrate the results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]