A priori error estimates for a linearized fracture control problem

A control problem for a linearized time-discrete regularized fracture propagation process is considered. The discretization of the problem is done using a conforming finite element method. In contrast to many works on discretization of PDE constrained optimization problems, the particular setting has to cope with the fact that the linearized fracture equation is not necessarily coercive. A quasi-best approximation result will be shown in the case of an invertible, though not necessarily coercive, linearized fracture equation. Based on this a priori error estimates for the control, state, and adjoint variables will be derived.