Inverse source problem for a space-time fractional diffusion equation (Q1711817)

Quite often, diffusion and other transport processes demonstrate anomalous behavior. One of the possible techniques that may be used to model such processes is using fractional derivatives. The authors explore an inverse initial boundary problem with Dirichlet-type boundary conditions for a difusion equation where both space and time derivatives are Caputo fractional derivatives. The problem is overdetermined: not only initial conditions, but also ``final'' conditions at some moment of time are known. It allows to find not only the temperature (or concentration) but the heat source intensity as well. To do this, eigenfunction expansion is used. The authors obtain explicit expressions for the functions of interest. They also prove existence and uniqueness of the inverse problem's solution. Several special cases of the problem are considered as examples of the general theory that was built.