Emergence of time periodic solutions for the generalized surface quasi-geostrophic equation in the disc (Q6075498)

The paper is concerned with special time-periodic solutions to the surface quasi-geostrophic equation \begin{gather*} \partial_t \omega + u\cdot\nabla \omega = 0 \, \quad \text{ with } \quad u = -\nabla^{\perp} (-\Delta)^{-1+\frac{\alpha}{2}} \omega \quad \text{ in } [0, \, \infty)\times \mathbb{D} \, ,\\ \omega(0) = \omega_0 :=\mathbf{1}_{D_0}\quad \text{ in } \mathbb{D} \, , \end{gather*} with \(0 < \alpha < 1\) and with the initial patch \(D_0 \subset \mathbb{D}\), where \(\mathbb{D} \subset \mathbb{R}^2\) is the unit disc. Here, \(\mathbf{1}_{D_0}\) denotes the characteristic function of the subdomain \(D_0\). It is proved that there exist a countable family of so-called \(m-\)fold symmetric V-states bifurcating from the trivial time-constant solution \(\mathbf{1}_{b\mathbb{D}}\) where \(b \, \mathbb{D}\) is the disc with radius \(0< b < 1\). These solutions assume the form \(\omega(t) =\mathbf{1}_{\mathbb{D}_t}\) where for \(t > 0\) the boundary of the domain \(D_t\) is described by the complex-valued map \(z(t, \, \theta) = e^{i \, \Omega \, t} \, \sqrt{b^2 + 2 \, r(\theta)} \, e^{i\theta}\) with fixed parameters \(0 < b < 1\) and \(\Omega \in \mathbb{R}\). The function \(r\) represents the deformation from the disc shape and together with the angular velocity \(\Omega\), it is subject to an integro-differential equation \(F(\Omega, \, r) = 0\) with \begin{align*} F(\Omega, \, r) := \Omega \, \partial_\theta r +\partial_\theta \int_0^{2\pi}\int_0^{\sqrt{b^2+2r(\eta)}}K^{\alpha}\Big(\sqrt{b^2+2r(\theta)}e^{i\theta},\rho \, e^{i\eta}\Big) \, \rho \, d\rho \, d\eta\, . \end{align*} Here, \(K^{\alpha}\) denotes the Green function for \((-\Delta)^{-1+\frac{\alpha}{2}}\). In comparison to earlier works on this topic for the whole space case, the study of \(F\) for the bounded domain case is complicated by the fact that the expression of \(K^\alpha(x,y)\) is not explicit. However, up to an additive smooth perturbation \(K^{\alpha}_1\), the authors are able to establish that \begin{align*} K^\alpha(x,y) = c_\alpha \, |x-y|^{-\alpha} + K^\alpha_1(x,y) \quad \text{ for } \quad x,y \in \mathbb{D} \, . \end{align*} In connection with singular integral estimates, this is one important step to show that the operator \(F\) is regular enough to apply the Crandall-Rabinowitz bifurcation-theorem. The second important step is checking that the kernel of the operator \(\partial_rF(\Omega,0)\) is exactly one-dimensional. At the end of a complex frequency analysis, the authors manage to show that this is the case for a monotone sequence \(\{\Omega^{\alpha}_{m,b}\}_m\) of values under some mild constraints on the parameters \(\alpha\), \(b\) and \(m\).