This paper is intended to present wavelet Galerkin schemes for the boundary element method. Wavelet Galerkin schemes employ appropriate wavelet bases for the discretization of boundary integral operators. This yields quasisparse system matrices which can be compressed to O(N_J) relevant matrix entries without compromising the accuracy of the underlying Galerkin scheme. Herein, O(N_J) denotes the number of unknowns. The assembly of the compressed system matrix can be performed in O(N_J) operations. Therefore, we arrive at an algorithm which solves boundary integral equations within optimal complexity. By numerical experiments we provide results which corroborate the theory.

This paper is intended to present wavelet Galerkin schemes for the boundary element method. Wavelet Galerkin schemes employ appropriate wavelet bases for the discretization of boundary integral operators. This yields quasisparse system matrices which can be compressed to O(N_J) relevant matrix entries without compromising the accuracy of the underlying Galerkin scheme. Herein, O(N_J) denotes the number of unknowns. The assembly of the compressed system matrix can be performed in O(N_J) operations. Therefore, we arrive at an algorithm which solves boundary integral equations within optimal complexity. By numerical experiments we provide results which corroborate the theory.