Hydrodynamical behavior of symmetric exclusion with slow bonds (Q1951504)

The exclusion process in the one-dimensional discrete torus with \(N\) points is studied. All the bonds are taken to have conductance one, except for a finite number of slow bonds, with conductance \(N^{-\beta}\), with \(\beta \in [0,+\infty)\). The authors study the time evolution of the empirical density if the particles. In particular, they show that under the diffusive rescaling, the hydrodynamic limit is given by a parabolic partial differential equation which depends on the value of the parameter \(\beta\). When \(\beta \in [0,1)\), the hydrodynamic limit is given by the usual heat equation. When \(\beta =1\), it is given by a parabolic equation involving an operator \(\frac{d}{d x}\frac{d}{d W}\) where \(W\) is the Lebesgue measure on the torus plus the sum of the Dirac measure supported on each macroscopic point related to the slow bond. Finally, when \(\beta > 1\), the hydrodynamic limit is given by the heat equation with von Neumann's boundary conditions. The technical tool used for the proof of the main results is a replacement lemma, which allows the authors to replace the product of site occupancies by functions of the empirical measure in the continuum limit, and to also characterize the behavior near the slow bonds.