Existence and uniqueness of classical solutions of the equations of motion for second-grade fluids (Q1311433)

Although the Navier-Stokes equations are widely considered to be an excellent model for describing the behaviour of fluids, a constitutively more general model can be needed in examining ``non-Newtonian'' fluids. The results contained in this paper are for an incompressible fluid with higher order term dependence of the stress tensor on strain than for the Navier-Stokes' case. The equations read \(v_ t - \alpha_ 1 \Delta v_ t + v\cdot \nabla(v - \alpha_ 1 \Delta v) - \mu \Delta v + \nabla p = N(V)\), \(\nabla\cdot v = 0\), where \(N(v)\) denotes a sum of certain nonlinear terms and \(\alpha_ 1 > 0\) is a constant.The authors obtain local existence of classical solutions in two and three dimensions for the initial-boundary value problem with \(v = 0\) on the boundary of the spatial domain, and global existence of solutions for small initial data with large enough \(\alpha_ 1\).