Numerical approximations for the nonlinear time fractional reaction–diffusion equation

Abstract In this article, we propose an implicit pseudospectral scheme for nonlinear time fractional reaction–diffusion equations with Neumann boundary conditions, which is based upon Gauss–Lobatto–Legendre–Birkhoff pseudospectral method in space and finite difference method in time. A priori estimate of numerical solution is given firstly. Then the existence of numerical solution is proved by Brouwer fixed point theorem and the uniqueness is obtained. It is proved rigorously that the fully discrete scheme is unconditionally stable and convergent. Furthermore, we develop a modified scheme by adding correction terms for the problem with nonsmooth solutions. Numerical examples are given to verify the theoretical analysis.