On the well-posedness of weakly hyperbolic equations with time-dependent coefficients (Q439103)

The authors study the well-posedness for weakly hyperbolic equations of higher order of general form with time-dependent coefficients. Consider the Cauchy problem as follows, \[ D^m_t u= \sum^{m-1}_{j=0} A_{m-j}(t, D_x) D^j_t u+ f(t, x),\;(t,x)\in [0,T]\times \mathbb R^n, \] \[ D^{k-1}_t u(0,x)= g_k(x),\quad k= 1,\dots, m, \] where \(A_{m-j}(t, D_x)\) is a differential operator of order \(m-j\) with continuous coefficients only depending on \(t\), and \(D_t={1\over i}\partial_t\) and \(D_x={1\over i}\partial_x\). Denote by \(A_{(m-j)}\) the principal part of \(A_{m-j}\) and let \(\tau_k(t,\xi)\), \(k= 1,\dots, m\), be the roots of the characteristic equation \[ \tau^m= \sum^{m-1}_{j=0} A_{(m-j)}(t, \xi)\,\tau^j. \] The following two cases are considered. Case 1. Assume that the roots \(\tau_k(t,\xi)\), \(k= 1,\dots, m\), are real-valued and of Hölder class \(C^\alpha\), \(0<\alpha\leq 1\), with respect to \(t\); for any \(t\in[0, T]\) they either coincide or are all distinct. Case 2. There exists \(r\in[2, m- 1]\) such that the roots \(\tau_k(t,\tau)\), \(k= 1,\dots, r\), are real-valued, of class \(C^\alpha\), \(0<\alpha\leq 1\), with respect to \(t\) and either coincide or are all distinct and that the roots \(\tau_k(t,\tau)\), \(k= r+1,\dots, m\), are real-valued, of class \(C^\beta\), \(0<\beta\leq 1\), with respect to \(t\) and are all distinct. Then the authors prove the following Theorem. Let \(T>0\) and \(0\leq l\leq m-1\), assume the conditions of Case 1. Then for any \(g_k(x)\in G^s(\mathbb R^n)\) \((k=1,\dots, m)\), the Cauchy problem has unique global solution \(u\in C^m([0,T]; G^s(\mathbb R^n))\), provides that \(1\leq s< 1+\min\{\alpha,{m-l\over m}\}\). Furthermore let \(2\leq r\leq m-1\) and assume the conditions of the Case 2. Then the solution \(u\in C^m([0, T]; G^s(\mathbb R^n))\) exists if \(1\leq s< 1+ \min\{\alpha,{\beta\over r-\beta}\}\).