A constrained variational model for radial symmetry breaking (Q2858130)

This paper deals with a variational problem that involves an integral constraint and describing a symmetry breaking of a circular front around a point source. Such a study is motivated by the experimental observations of the polygonal hydraulic jumps. This paper responds to the following questions:NEWLINENEWLINE (a) Exactly how do branches of the polygonal solutions bifurcate from the circular solution? How does the amplitude of modulations depend on the bifurcation parameter?NEWLINENEWLINE(b) How are the branches terminated? Do they disappear at a finite total flux or continue up to arbitrarily large values?NEWLINENEWLINE(c) Can we analyze the second variation of the problem so that we can conclude that the solutions to the first variation are indeed minimizing the circumference or not?NEWLINENEWLINEThe paper is clearly written and the proofs rely on simple variational or asymptotic analysis methods.