Boundary conditions for planar Stokes equations inducing vortices around concave corners (Q2283065)

The authors consider the Stokes flow in a bounded domain \(Q \in \mathbb{R}^3\) which contains an obstacle \(D\). The study is focused on a multiple connected \(D\), given by a suspension bridge which undergoes oscillations. To this end, some nonstandard boundary conditions, related with the normal velocity, tangential velocity, vorticity and pressure are used. The procedure given in [\textit{C. Begue} et al., Pitman Res. Notes Math. Ser. 181, 179--264 (1988; Zbl 0687.35069)] is extended and the 3D problem is reduced to a 2D problem. The well-posedness is obtained by using a particular form of the Lax-Milgram Theorem and some results given in [\textit{C. Conca} et al., Jpn. J. Math., New Ser. 20, No. 2, 279--318 (1994; Zbl 0826.35093)]. An important step is to determine possible boundary data which give rise to vortices. The main example is a planar region having a concave right angle. The possible singularities near the corner (described in some functional spaces with weighted norms) are obtained through explicit trigonometric and logarithmic functions, by using the separation of variables for biharmonic equations. The obtained formulas are very elegant and give results very close to the performed experiments carried out by the authors at Politecnico di Milano.