On a nonlinear diffusion system with resource-consumer interaction (Q1430978)

The paper is dealing with the proof of well-posedness and asymptotic behavior of solutions to coupled reaction-diffusion equations with nonlinear diffusion, \[ \begin{aligned} u_t&=\Delta(u^k) + u^mv -a(u,v)u^n,\\ v_t &= \Delta(v^l) -u^mv,\end{aligned} \] where \(u(x,y,t)\) and \(v(x,y,t)\) are concentrations of the ``consumer'' and ``resource'', \(\Delta\) is the two-dimensional Laplacian (diffusion operator), \(k,l,m\), and \(n\) are positive integers, and \(a(u,v)\) is a positive function. This model finds various applications in chemistry (autocatalytic reactions), biology (description of bacterial populations), and other areas. Deriving uniform in time \(L^{\infty}\) bounds on solutions, the existence, uniqueness, and continuity of weak solutions to the initial-value problem is proved. It is rigorously proved too that, in the limit of \(t\to\infty\), both \(u(x,y,t)\) and \(v(x,y,t)\) tend to constant uniform values. However, direct simulations demonstrate that the nonlinear system (e.g., with \(k=2\) and \(l=m=n=1\)) develops nontrivial patterns in the transient dynamics. It is observed that an original ring-shaped distribution of the concentrations is strongly unstable against perturbations which break their axial symmetry. The developing patterns modulated in the azimuthal direction may feature, e.g., a six-fold structure.