Determination of a time-dependent coefficient in a quasi-linear parabolic equation (Q1058072)

Let be \(\Omega:=\{x,t)\in {\mathbb{R}}^ 2| x>0\), \(0<t<T\}\). This paper deals with the quasilinear parabolic problem \(u_ t-b(t)c(u)u_{xx}=0\) in \(\Omega\), \(u(.,0)=0\) in \({\mathbb{R}}^+\), \(u_ x(0,.)=h_ 1\) in (0,T), \(u(0,.)=h_ 0\) in (0,T). The main objective is to study the inverse problem of determining the function b from this overdetermined problem, where b is assumed to be bounded, strictly positive and to belong to a certain Hölder space (whose index is connected to the index of a Sobolev space containing \(h_ 0)\). In order to achieve this objective, the author first proves an estimate that implies Lipschitz continuous dependence of u on b, c, and \(h_ 1\) with respect to suitable Sobolev norms. Then he derives an integral equation for b and proves a stability result for the inverse problem.