Time-dependent singularities in the heat equation (Q2339866)

The authors study time-dependent removable singularities of solutions to the heat equation \[ u_t=\Delta u\quad \text{in}\;D. \] Here, \[ D=\{(x,t)\in \mathbb{R}^{N+1}:\;x\in \Omega\setminus \{\xi(t)\},\;t\in (0,T)\}, \] with a domain \(\Omega\subset \mathbb{R}^N,\) \(N\geq3,\) \(T\in(0,\infty],\) and \(\xi: \mathbb{R}\to \mathbb{R}^N\) is a continuous function such that \(\xi(t)\in\Omega\) for \(t\in(0,T).\) Recall that the singularity at \(x = \xi(t)\) is said to be removable if there exists a function \(\tilde u\) that satisfies the heat equation in \(\Omega\times(0,T)\) in the classical sense and \(\tilde{u}\equiv u\) on \(D.\) The main result of the paper shows that a singularity is removable if it is weaker than the order of the fundamental solution \(\Psi(x)\) of the Laplacian. More precisely, assuming that \(\xi\) is locally \(1/2\) Hölder continuous in \(\mathbb{R}\) and that the solution \(u(x,t)\) of the heat equation satisfies \[ |u(x,t)|=\text{o}\left( \Psi(x-\xi(t))\right)\quad \text{as}\;x\to \xi(t)\;\text{locally uniformly in}\;t\in(0,T), \] then the singularity of \(u\) at \(x = \xi(t)\) is removable. Some examples of non-removable singularities are also given, which show the optimality of the condition for removability.