On decay properties of solutions for degenerate strongly damped wave equations of Kirchhoff type (Q541248)

This work is concerned with certain decay estimates of a damped generalised Kirchhoff equation. This equation is a second order hyperbolic integro-differential equations with \(n\) space and a time variables. It is assumed that \(u\) vanishes at the boundary of the domain. Damping is provided as the product of the Laplacian of \(u\) and the velocity \(u'\). By employing techniques of functional analysis, the author obtains an optimal decay estimate, which is inversely proportional to a power of \(1+t\), for the norm of the gradient of \(u\) for sufficiently small initial data. In obtaining the decay estimates, the author uses an appropriately defined energy functional. During this process, some decay estimates for the \(L^2\)-norms of the velocity, the gradient of the velocity and the acceleration are also produced.