The unsymmetric finite element formulation and variational incorrectness

The unsymmetric finite element formulation has been proposed recently to improve predictions from distorted finite elements. Studies have also shown that this special formulation using parametric functions for the test functions and metric functions for the trial functions works surprisingly well because the former satisfy the continuity conditions while the latter ensure that the stress representation during finite element computation can retrieve in a best-fit manner, the actual variation of stress in the metric space. However, a question that remained was whether the unsymmetric formulation was variationally correct. Here we determine that it is not, using the simplest possible element to amplify the principles.