Combined effects of two nonlinearities in lifespan of small solutions to semi-linear wave equations (Q330874)

The authors investigate the combined effects of two distinctive power-type nonlinear terms (with parameters \(p, q > 1\)) in the lifespan of small solutions to the Cauchy problem of semi-linear wave equations \(\partial_t^2 u-\Delta u=|\partial_t u|^p+|u|^q\), \(x\in \mathbb{R}^n\). The problem can be regarded as a natural combination of the following two well-investigated problems \(\partial_t^2 v-\Delta v=|v|^q\) and \(\partial_t^2 w-\Delta w=|\partial_t w|^p\). The first problem is in relation with the Strauss conjecture, and it is known that the problem admits global small solutions only if \(q>q_c\), where the critical power is the positive root of the quadratic equation \((n-1)q^2-(n+1)q-2=0\), that is, \[ q_c:=\frac{n+1+\sqrt{n^2+10n-7}}{2(n-1)}. \] The global existence is known for \(q_c<q<1+4/(n-1)\). See \textit{H. Lindblad} et al. [Math. Ann. 359, 637--661 (2014; Zbl 1295.35327)] and references therein for history and recent works for this problem on various spacetimes background. For the second problem, it is conjectured that the critical power is given by \((n-1)(p_c-1)=2\), i.e., \(p_c=1+2/(n-1)\), which is known as the Glassey conjecture and has been verified for \(n\leq 3\) or the radial case with \(p_c<p<1+2/(n-2)\). See \textit{C. Wang} [Trans. Amer. Math. Soc. 367, 7429--7451 (2015; Zbl 1330.35259)] for history and recent works on this problem. For the combination of the nonlinearities, it is known from \textit{W. Han} and \textit{Y. Zhou} [Comm. Partial Differential Equations 39, 651--665 (2014; Zbl 1295.35128)] that there are no global solutions for \(n\geq 2\), \(q>q_c\), \(p>p_c\) and \((q-1)((n-1)p-2)<4\). The first main result of this paper determines the dichotomy between the global solvability and the blow up for the problem. More precisely, when \(n\leq 3\), it is shown that the problem admits global small solutions if and only if \(q>q_c\), \(p>p_c\), and \((q-1)((n-1)p-2)\geq 4\). Moreover, when \(n=2,3\), for \(p, q\geq 2\) and \(q>2/(n-1)\), the authors obtain sharp estimates of the lifespan, with the only exception \(q=q_c\leq p\). For the critical case \(q=q_c\leq p\) and \(n=2,3\), it is shown that \(\exp(c\epsilon^{1-q})\leq T_\epsilon\leq \exp(C \epsilon^{-q(q-1)})\) and the sharp estimate of the lifespan remains open.