On the unsteady Poiseuille flow in a pipe (Q2461524)

Consider the flow of an incompressible viscous fluid through an infinite straight pipe of constant cross-section \(\sigma\). The authors address the seemingly simple problem of determining the pressure drop as a function of time, which produces a prescribed flow rate. The problem is far from being trivial and can be formulated as follows: find the pair \((u(x,t), q(t))\), satisfying \[ \dfrac{\partial}{\partial t} u(x,t)-\nu\Delta u(x,t)=q(t)+f(x,t), \] \[ u(x,t)| _{\partial\sigma}=0,\quad u(x,0)=u_0(x), \] \[ \int_{\sigma}u(x,t)\,dx=F(t), \] where \(u_0, f, F\) are given functions. The main goal of the paper is to find an equation relating \(q(t)\) and \(F(t)\). For the problem with data \(u_0=f=0\) such an equation is the following Volterra integral equation \[ q(\tau)=\int^{\tau}_0 K(\tau -t)q(t)\,dt+\Phi(\tau), \] where \(\Phi(\tau)=F'(\sigma)/| \sigma| \). The kernel \(K\) is expressed by the formula \[ K(s):=\dfrac{1}{| \sigma| }\frac{d^2}{ds^2}\int_{\sigma}\Theta(x,s)\,dx, \] where the function \(\Theta\) is obtained by solving an initial-boundary value problem for the heat equation in \(\sigma\times(0,T)\). In turn the initial condition for \(\Theta\) is the solution of the Poisson equation \(-\nu\Delta\Psi(x)=1\) with zero boundary data on \(\partial\sigma\). This approach is fully analyzed as well as its computational implications.