Existence of solutions to heat equations with singular lower order terms (Q2442904)

The article studies the solvability of the following heat equation in \(\mathbb{R}^N\) (\(N \geq 2\)) with singular lower-order terms: \[ \frac{\partial u}{\partial t}(x,t) = \Delta u(x,t) - \frac{\beta x}{| x |^2} \cdot \nabla u(x,t) + \frac{c}{| x |^2} u(x,t) + f(x,t) \quad \text{in }\quad \mathbb{R}^N \times (0,T) \] \[ u(x,0) = u_0(x) \quad \text{in }\quad \mathbb{R}^N, \] where \(\beta \in \mathbb{R}\) and \(c \leq (N-2-\beta)^2/4\) and \(T \in (0,\infty]\). The case \(\beta = 0\) is studied in [\textit{P. Baras} and \textit{J. A. Goldstein}, Trans. Am. Math. Soc. 284, 121--139 (1984; Zbl 0556.35063)]. There the following was shown: There exists an \(N\)-dependent critical parameter \(\lambda_0\) such that for \(c \leq \lambda_0\) the problem has a solution in \(L^1(\mathbb{R}^N, | x |^{-\alpha} \, dx)\) for suitably chosen \(\alpha\) and positive initial values \(u_0\) in \(L^1(\mathbb{R}^N, | x |^{-\alpha} \, dx)\) and positive \(f\) in \(L^1(0,T; L^1(\mathbb{R}^N, | x |^{-\alpha} \, dx)\), whereas for \(c > \lambda_0\) the problem has no local positive solution for all non-zero positive intial values and all positive \(f\). Later the problem was studied in [\textit{W. Arendt} et al., Contemp. Math. 412, 51--68 (2006; Zbl 1113.26017)] in the case \(\beta \neq 0\) and \(f = 0\). There the existence of solutions was established for certain \(c \leq \lambda_{\beta, p}\) by showing the existence of an \(m\)-accretive realization in \(L^p(\mathbb{R}^N, | x |^{-\beta} \, dx)\) of the differential operator on the right-hand side of the equation. The authors notice that there is a gap between the possible (formal) ranges of \(c\) in the two aforementioned articles and that the regularity of the solutions is not clarified in [Zbl 1113.26017]. In this article the authors give answers to these questions. They show the existence of a weak solution of the problem in certain improved parameter ranges together with regularity estimates on this solution. In order to achieve this, the authors use a new approach to the problem: they study an \(\varepsilon\)-perturbation of the problem which regularizes the singularities in the potentials and show that the so-obtained differential operators generate analytic semigroups on \(L^p(\mathbb{R}^N, | x |^{-\beta} \, dx)\) together with \(\varepsilon\)-independent estimates on the solutions. The existence of a weak solution together with its regularity properties is then established by a limiting argument.