Revisiting Li-Yau type inequalities on Riemannian manifolds (Q6187270)

Let \((M^n,g)\) be a complete Riemannian manifold endowed with a lower bounded Ricci curvature. Li-Yau inequality provides an upper bound on the gradient estimates of positive solutions to the heat equation \[ \partial_tu=\Delta_g u\ \text{ on } (M^n,g), \tag{1}\] [\textit{P. Li} and \textit{S. T. Yau}, Acta Math. 156, 154--201 (1986; Zbl 0611.58045)]. The purpose of the present article is to furnish refined global and local Hamilton gradient estimates for \((1)\) (Theorems 2.1 and 3.3). Then, by assuming a meaningful nonlinear condition, the authors provide a general version of Li-Yau gradient estimate for \((1)\) (Theorem 3.1).