The vanishing viscosity limit in the presence of a porous medium (Q303624)

Consider the flow of a viscous, incompressible Newtonian fluid in a planar, regularly perforated domain, described by the exterior of a regular lattice of rigid particles. The authors discuss the question what happens when the fluid viscosity, the particle size and the particle distance approach zero simultaneously. The perforated domain can be identified with a planar, porous medium when the number of particles on the lattice becomes infinite. Under the general assumption that the particle size is dominated by the particle distance the authors prove that the solutions of the Navier-Stokes equations on the perforated domain converge to solutions of the Euler equations on the whole plane in the asymptotic limit when particle size, particle distance and viscosity vanish in suitable relation with each other. Hence in this limit, the flow becomes inviscid and is unaffected by the porous medium. Explicit rates of convergence (in the energy norm) are given.