Relaxation times for atom dislocations in crystals (Q2628960)

The authors study the relaxation times for a parabolic differential equation whose solution represents the atom dislocation in a crystal. The goal is to provide accurate estimates on the relaxation times of the system after collision. To this end the authors investigate the problem \[ (v_\varepsilon)t= \frac{1}{\varepsilon}\bigg(I_sv_{\varepsilon} -\frac{1}{\varepsilon^{2s}}W'(v_\varepsilon)+\sigma(t,x)\bigg)\text{ in }(0,+\infty)\times \mathbb R \] \[ v_{\varepsilon}(0,\cdot)=v^0_{\varepsilon}\text{ on }\mathbb R \] where \(\varepsilon>0\) is a small scale parameter, \(W\) is a periodic potential and \(I_s\) is the so-called fractional Laplacian of any order \(2s\in (0,2)\). Precisely, \[ I_s[\varphi](x):=PV\int_{\mathbb R^N}\frac{\varphi(x+y)-\varphi(x)}{|y|^{N+2s}}dy, \] \(\varphi\in C^2(\mathbb R^N)\cap L^\infty(\mathbb R^N) \), and \(PV\) stands for the principal value of the integral. On the potential \(W\) the authors assume that \[ W\in C^{3,\alpha}(\mathbb R)\text{ for some }0<\alpha<1, \] \[ W(v+1)=W(v)\text{ for any }v\in \mathbb R \] \[ W=0\text{ on }\mathbb Z, \] \[ W>0\text{ on }\mathbb R\backslash \mathbb Z, \] \[ W''(0)>0\text{ for any }v\in \mathbb R. \] The function \(\sigma\) satisfies: \[ \sigma\in B\cup C([0,+\infty)\times \mathbb R)\text{ and for }M>0\text{ and }\alpha\in (s,1), \] \[ \|\sigma_x\|_L^\infty ([0,+\infty)\times \mathbb R)+\|\sigma_t\|_L^\infty ([0,+\infty)\times \mathbb R)\leq M, \] \[ |\sigma_x(t,x+h)-\sigma_x(t,x)|\leq M|h|^{\alpha},\text{ for every }x,h\in \mathbb R\text{ and }t\in [0,+\infty). \]