Asymptotic behaviour of the energy in partially viscoelastic materials (Q4414928)

The authors investigate mathematical models of materials consisting of an elastic part (without memory) and viscoelastic part, where the dissipation given by the memory is effective. The model is described by the hyperbolic equation with a memory term \[ u_{tt}-\Delta u + \int_0^t g(t-\tau)\text{div}\{a(x)\nabla u\} d\tau = 0 \text{ in }\Omega\times (0,\infty), \] \[ u(x,0)=u_0(x),\;u_t(x,0)=u_1(x)\text{ in }\Omega,\;u(x,t)=0\text{ on }\Gamma \times (0,\infty),\;\Gamma=\partial \Omega. \] Partial viscoelaticity is realized by the following hypotheses on \(a\): \(a\in C^2(\bar \Omega)\); \(a(x)=0\;\text{on} \Omega\setminus \omega_\epsilon\), \(a(x)=1\;\text{on} \omega_{\epsilon/2}\), \(|\nabla a(x)|^2\leq c|a(x)|^2,\) \(\omega_\epsilon=(\bigcup_{x\in \Gamma_0} B_\epsilon(x))\cap \Omega,\;B_\epsilon(x)=\{y\in \mathbb R^n;\;\|x-y\|\leq \epsilon\},\;\Gamma_0=\{x\in \Gamma;\;(x-x_0).\nu\geq 0\}\) where \(\nu\) is the unitary normal defined over \(\Gamma\), and \(x_0\) is any point of \(\mathbb R^n.\) It is shown that the solutions of the partial viscoelastic initial-boundary value problem decay exponentially to zero, provided the relaxation function \(g\) also decays exponentially, no matter how small the viscoelastic part of the material is.