In this paper, a quantitative measure of partial observability is defined for
PDEs. The quantity is proved to be consistent if the PDE is approximated using
well-posed approximation schemes. A first order approximation of an
unobservability index using an empirical Gramian is introduced. Several
examples are presented to illustrate the concept of partial observability,
including Burgers' equation and a one-dimensional nonlinear shallow water
equation.Comment: 5 figures, 25 pages. arXiv admin note: substantial text overlap with
arXiv:1111.584
