Stochastic Navier-Stokes equations: Analysis of the noise to have a unique invariant measure (Q1570440)

A two-dimensional stochastic Navier-Stokes equation, driven by an infinite-dimensional Wiener process, is considered. \textit{F. Flandoli} and \textit{B. Maslowski} [Commun. Math. Phys. 172, No. 1, 119-141 (1995; Zbl 0845.35080)] were the first who proved, under suitable hypotheses on the (constant) diffusion coefficient, uniqueness of the invariant measure for this system by establishing the strong Feller property and irreducibility of the associated transition semigroup. These two properties, however, were obtained with respect to different topologies on the state space, and an additional argument was needed to get the result. Later, \textit{B. Ferrario} [Stochastics Stochastics Rep. 60, No. 3-4, 271-288 (1997; Zbl 0882.60059)] succeeded in showing that, under the same assumptions, the strong Feller property and irreducibility hold if \(\text{Dom}(A^{\alpha})\) is chosen as the state space for an appropriate \(\alpha>0\), \(A\) denoting the Stokes operator. Uniqueness and global asymptotical stability of the invariant measure then follow from the standard theory. In the paper under review, the author aims at strengthening her results in the case of periodic boundary conditions, by relaxing assumptions on the noise term and allowing more degenerate diffusion coefficients. Let us note that recently a completely different approach to uniqueness of invariant measures for two-dimensional stochastic Navier-Stokes equations has been proposed by \textit{J. C. Mattingly} [Commun. Math. Phys. 206, No. 2, 273-288 (1999; Zbl 0953.37023)]; his method works for degenerate noises but viscosity must be large enough.