Eventual smoothness and asymptotics in a three-dimensional chemotaxis system with logistic source (Q2254013)

The author consider the chemotaxis system (CS) \[ \begin{aligned} u_t&=\Delta u - \nabla \cdot \left(u \nabla v\right)+k\;u-\mu\;u^2,\\ v_t &=\Delta v - v + u,\end{aligned} \] under homogeneous Neumann boundary conditions in a bounded, convex, smooth domain \(\Omega \subset \mathbb{R}^{N}\). Solutions are sought in the following weak sense: \((u,v) \in L^2_{\text{loc}}([0,\infty);L^2(\Omega)) \times L^2_{\text{loc}}([0,\infty);W^{1,2}(\Omega))\) is a solution of the system above for the initial data \((u_0,v_0) \in L^2(\Omega) \times W^{1,2}(\Omega)\) if for all \(\varphi \in C_{0}^{\infty}(\overline{\Omega} \times [0,\infty))\), \[ \begin{aligned} -\int_{0}^{\infty}\int_{\Omega}u\;\varphi_{t}-\int_{\Omega}u_0\;\varphi(0) &=\int_{0}^{\infty}\int_{\Omega}u\;\Delta \varphi \\ & - \int_{0}^{\infty}\int_{\Omega}u\nabla v\cdot \nabla \varphi+k\;\int_{0}^{\infty}\int_{\Omega}u\;\varphi-\mu\;\int_{0}^{\infty}\int_{\Omega}u^2\;\varphi,\end{aligned} \] and for all \(\varphi \in C_{0}^{\infty}(\overline{\Omega} \times [0,\infty))\), \[ -\int_{0}^{\infty}\int_{\Omega}v\;\varphi_{t}-\int_{\Omega}v_0\;\varphi(0)=- \int_{0}^{\infty}\int_{\Omega}\nabla v\cdot \nabla \varphi -\int_{0}^{\infty}\int_{\Omega}v\;\varphi+\;\int_{0}^{\infty}\int_{\Omega}u\;\varphi. \] The paper contains three main results. The first one is the existence of a nonnegative weak solution that can be approximated in the sense of a.e. convergence by solutions of the approximate system \[ \begin{aligned} u_{\varepsilon t} &=\Delta u_{\varepsilon} - \nabla \cdot \left(u_{\varepsilon} \nabla v_{\varepsilon}\right)+k\;u_{\varepsilon}-\mu\;u_{\varepsilon}^2-\varepsilon\;u_{\varepsilon}^{\theta},\\ v_{\varepsilon t} &=\Delta v_{\varepsilon} - v_{\varepsilon} + u_{\varepsilon},\end{aligned} \] under homogeneous Neumann boundary conditions and initial data \(u_{0,\varepsilon} \in C(\overline{\Omega})\), \(v_{0,\varepsilon} \in W^{1,N+1}(\Omega)\), where \(\theta \in \mathbb{R}\), \(\theta>N+1\). For \(N=3\) and any \(\mu>0\), it is proved that there exists \(k_0>0\) such that if \(k<k_0\), there is \(T>0\) such that \((u,v)\) is a classical solution for \(t>T\). The second theorem (with \(N=3\)) shows that if \(k\leq 0\), then all solutions approach the trivial steady state (in the sense of uniform convergence) as \(t\) tends to \(\infty\). The third theorem (also with \(N=3\)), on the existence of an absorbing set, deals with the case in which \(k\) is positive and sufficiently small: there exist \(k_0>0\) such that for all \(k <k_0\) there is \(\alpha>0\) and a bounded set \(B_{\mu,k}\) in \(C^{2+\alpha}(\overline{\Omega})^2\) such that, for all initial data \((u_0,v_0)\) in \(L^2(\Omega) \times W^{1,2}(\Omega)\), the solution \((u,v)\) obtained from Theorem \(1\) admits the existence of \(T>0\) such that \((u(t),v(t))\) belongs to \(B_{\mu,k}\) for all \(t\) greater than \(T\). It is also proved that for each fixed \(\mu>0\), the diameter of \(B_{\mu,k}\) in \(L^{\infty}(\Omega) \times W^{1,\infty}(\Omega)\) tends to zero as \(k\) goes to zero. In the second section of the paper, the existence of a unique, global, classical solution is proved for the approximate problem. In the third section, estimates for the approximate problem are obtained from the equations using ODE comparison arguments. In Section 4, the eventual boundedness of \((u_{\varepsilon},v_{\varepsilon})\) in \(L^{\infty}(\Omega) \times W^{1,\infty}(\Omega)\) is proved, using \(L^p-L^q\) estimates for the heat semigroup. Section 5 contains the definition of weak solution described previously. In Section 6, using compactness arguments, the boundedness of sequences of approximate solutions produce a weak solution for the original problem. In Section 7, the eventual smoothness of weak solutions for the system (CS) is proved, using results from Section 4 and results on the unique solvability of generalized solutions from the monograph of Ladyzhenskaya-Solonnikov-Uralseva (Reference 11). The final Section 8 deals with the long-time behavior of the solutions of the system (CS), proving Theorems \(2\) and \(3\).