Global existence, asymptotic behavior and blow-up of solutions for a viscoelastic equation with strong damping and nonlinear source (Q536514)

The author investigates the initial-boundary value problem for nonlinear viscoelastic equations with strong damping and a nonlinear source \[ \begin{aligned} u_{tt}-\Delta u +\int_0^t g(t-s)\Delta u(x,s)\,ds- \omega \Delta u_t+\mu u_t=|u|^{r-2}u, &\quad (x,t)\in \Omega\times (0,\infty),\\ u(x,0)=u_0(x),\;u_t(x,0)=u_1(x),\quad x\in \Omega, \qquad u(x,t)=0, &\quad (x,t)\in \partial\Omega\times [0,\infty),\end{aligned} \] where \(\Omega\) is an open Lipschitz subset of \(\mathbb R^n, n\geq 1,\) The relaxation function \(g\) is a positive and decaying function. The initial data fulfil \(u_0\in H_0^1(\Omega),\;u_1\in L^2(\Omega).\) Further assumptions are \(\omega>0,\;\mu>\omega\lambda_1\), where \(\lambda_1\) is the first eigenvalue of the operator \(-\Delta\) under the homogeneous Dirichlet boundary condition, and \(2<r<2^*=2n/(n-2)\) if \(n\geq 3\), \(2<r<\infty\) if \(n=1,2\). The local existence of solutions is proved using the Faedo-Galerkin method and fixed point theorem. By virtue of the potential well theory and convexity technique, the global existence and polynomial decay to zero is verified if the initial data enter into the stable set. The solution blows up in a finite time if the initial data enter into the unstable set. Moreover the solution decays exponentially or polynomially to zero depending on the rate of the relaxation function.