A system of parabolic equations in nonequilibrium thermodynamics including thermal and electrical effects (Q1385311): Difference between revisions

The paper under review is concerned with the following system of nonlinear PDE's in the cylinder \(\Omega \times (0, \tau)\): \[ \begin{aligned} \frac{\partial \rho_{i}}{\partial t}+ \text{div }J_{i} &= W_{i}\quad (i=1, \cdots, n), \tag{1}\\ \frac{\partial U}{\partial t}+ \text{div } J_{n+1}&= \sum^{n}_{k=1} F_{k} \cdot J_{k}+ W_{n+1},\tag{2}\\ -\Delta V&= \sum^{n}_{k=1 }e_{k} \rho_{k}+ C,\tag{3} \end{aligned} \] where \(\rho_{i}\) is the density, \(J_{i}\) the carrier flux density, \(e_{i}\) the particle charge \((i=1,\dots, n)\), \(U\) the internal energy density, \( J_{n+1}\) the heat flux, and \(C=C(x)\) a given function. Equations (1)--(3) model the evolution of a gas or fluid consisting of \(n\) components, in the bounded domain \( \Omega \subset \mathbb{R}^{d}\) \((d\geq 1)\). The following assumptions are made: \(\rho_{i}= \rho_{i}(u)\), \(\rho\) is strongly monotone, \(\rho= \bigtriangledown \chi\), \(F_{k} =-e_{k}\bigtriangledown V\), \(J_{i} =-\sum^{n+1}_{j=1} L_{ij}X_{j}\), where \[ u= \left\{ \frac{\mu_{1}}{T},\cdots,\frac{\mu_{1}}{T}, -\frac{1}{T} \right\}, \quad X_{i}= \bigtriangledown \left( \frac{\mu_{1}}{T}\right)+ e_{i} \frac{\bigtriangledown V}{T} \quad (i=1,\dots, n), \qquad X_{n+1}=- \bigtriangledown \left( \frac{1}{T}\right), \] where \(\mu_{i}\) is the chemical potential, and \(T\) is the temperature. Equations (1)--(3) are supplemented by mixed Dirichlet and Neumann conditions on \(u\) and \(V\) on \(\partial \Omega\), and the initial condition \(u( \cdot, 0)= u_{0}\) in \(\Omega\). The authors introduce new dependent variables \(w_{i}= u_{i}- e_{i} u_{n+1}V\) \((i=1,\cdots, n)\), \(w_{n+1}=u_{n+1}\), which symmetrize the problem under consideration. For this problem the existence of a weak solution is proved (when \(d=3\) only Dirichlet conditions on the whole boundary \(\partial \Omega\) are considered). The method of proof is based on a semidiscretization of time, where the resulting elliptic problems are solved by using estimates on the discrete entropy function and the Leray-Schauder fixed point theorem. In the last section the authors show that the solution tends to the thermal equilibrium state when \(\tau \rightarrow+ \infty\), if the boundary data are in thermal equilibrium.