Optimal decay rate for the wave equation on a square with constant damping on a strip (Q2359011)

In this interesting article, the author determines the exact decay rate for the energy of solutions to the initial value problem for the damped wave equation on the square with Dirichlet boundary conditions. More precisely, with \(\square:=\{(x,y)\in\mathbb{R}^2, 0< x,y< 1\}\), it is shown that for \(u_0\in H^2(\square)\cap H_0^1(\square)\) and \(u_1\in H_0^1(\square)\), the energy \[ E(t,u_0,u_1)=\frac{1}{2}\int_\square |\nabla u(t,x,y)|^2+|u_t(t,x,y)|^2d(x,y),\;t\in(0,\infty), \] with \(u\) being the solution to the damped wave equation \[ u_{tt}(t,x,y)-\Delta u(t,x,y)+2a(x)u_t(t,x,y)=0,\; (t,x,y)\in(0,\infty)\times\square, \] subject to the boundary condition \(u(t,x,y)=0, (t,x,y)\in (0,\infty)\times\partial\square,\) and the initial conditions \(u(0,\cdot)=u_0, u_t(0,\cdot)=u_1\) and where \(a(x)=a_0 1\!\!1_{[0,\sigma)}(x)\) with \(a_0>0, \sigma\in(0,1)\), satisfies \[ \sup_{\|u_0\|_{H^2}+\|u_1\|_{H^1}=1}E(t,u_0,u_1)^{1/2}\approx t^{-2/3}. \] This result answers a question posed by \textit{N. Anantharaman} and \textit{M. Léautaud} [Anal. PDE 7, No. 1, 159--214 (2014; Zbl 1295.35075)]. Due to an observation of the author, the above result on the decay rate is equivalent to the inverse \(P(s)^{-1}\) of the bijective continuous linear operators \[ P(s):H^2(\square)\cap H_0^1(\square)\rightarrow L_2(\square),u\mapsto -\Delta u-s^2u+2is\,a u \] satisfying \(\|P(s)^{-1}\|_{L_2\rightarrow L_2}\approx 1+|s|^{1/2}, s\in\mathbb{R}\). The latter asymptotic is proved by first deriving an explicit formula for \(P(s)^{-1}\) which is then carefully analyzed.