Non-negative periodic solution of a system of \((p(x),q(x))\)-Laplacian parabolic equations with delayed nonlocal terms (Q1002396)

This paper concerns a system of \(\{ p(x), q(x)\}\)-Laplacian parabolic equations with delayed nonlocal terms under the homogeneous Dirichlet boundary conditions over a bounded domain \(\Omega\) in \(\mathbb R^n\), where \(p(x), q(x) \in C^{1,\alpha}(\Omega)\) satisfy \(p(x)\), \(q(x)>2\) in \(\overline{\Omega}\). The system is a possible model of the coexistence of two different biological species sharing the same territory \(\Omega\). It is shown that there exists at least one pair of positive \(T\)-periodic solutions under some conditions on the inhomogeneous terms including the delayed nonlocal terms. The authors use a standard approach to deal with the degeneracy by replacing \(\text{div}(|\nabla u|^{p(x)-2}\nabla u)\) with \[ \text{div} \left((|\nabla u|^2+\varepsilon)^{\frac {p(x)-2}2}\nabla u\right) \] and they solve regularized non-degenerate problems by the topological degree theory. Finally, they send \(\varepsilon \to 0\) with the aid of a priori bounds and obtain a solution.