On stability of exterior stationary Navier-Stokes flows (Q1901117)

Let \((w, p)\) be the solution in exterior domain \(\Omega\subset \mathbb{R}^n\), \(n\geq 3\) of the stationary problem \[ - \Delta w+ w\cdot \nabla w+ \nabla p= f,\;\nabla\cdot w= 0\text{ in }\Omega,\;w|_S= w^*,\;w\to 0\;(|x|\to \infty).\tag{1} \] Here \(S\) is the smooth boundary of \(\Omega\). The authors show in the first section that the problem (1) possesses a solution \(w\) satisfying \(|w|\leq c/|x|\), \(|\nabla w|\leq c/|x|^2\) under appropriate assumptions on given data. Let us consider the nonstationary problem \[ \begin{cases} v_t+ v\cdot \nabla v- \Delta v+ \nabla q= f,\;t> 0,\;x\in \Omega\\ \nabla\cdot v= 0,\;t\geq 0,\;x\in \Omega,\;v|_S= w^*,\;v\to 0\;(|x|\to \infty),\;v|_{t= 0}= v_0.\end{cases}\tag{2} \] The differences \(u= v- w\), \(p'= q- p\) satisfy the problem \[ \begin{cases} u_t- \Delta u+ w\cdot \nabla u+ u\cdot \nabla w+ u\cdot \nabla u+ \nabla p'= 0,\;t> 0,\;x\in \Omega\\ \nabla\cdot u= 0,\;t\geq 0,\;x\in \Omega,\;u|_S= 0,\;u\to 0\;(|x|\to \infty),\;u|_{t= 0}= a,\end{cases}\tag{3} \] where \(a= v_0- w\). The main part of the paper is devoted to the study of existence and asymptotic behavior of the solution to (3). It is proved that under certain conditions the solution of (3) goes to \(0\) for \(t\to \infty\).