Finite time blowup of solutions of the hydrostatic Euler equations (Q6624902)

This article is concerned with the study of smooth solutions of the hydrostatic Euler equations \N\[\N\partial_t u+u\partial_x u+v\partial_y u=-\partial_xP\,,\quad \partial_xu+\partial_y v=0,\N\]\Nin a strip domain \(\mathbb{R}\times[0,1]=\{(x,y)|\,\,-\infty<x<+\infty\,,\,0\le y\le 1\}\) with initial data and boundary conditions \N\[\Nu|_{t=0}=u_0(x,y)\,,\quad v|_{y=0}=v|_{y=1}=0,\N\]\Nwhere \((u,v)\) and \(P\) stand for the velocity and pressure field respectively, with \(u=u(t,x,y)\), \(v=v(t,x,y)\), \(P=P(t,x)\) unknown functions, and where \(P\) is independent of \(y\). \N\NEven in two spatial dimensions, the well-posedness and ill-posedness of these equations are intricately hard because of the lack of evolution equation for the vertical velocity \(v\). At present, no global existence result is available, and the local well-posedness was established only for some special classes of solutions. \N\NThis paper deals with the blow-up behavior. Until now, the only rigorous blow-up results for the previous hydrostatic Euler equations are [\textit{C. Cao} et al., Commun. Math. Phys. 337, No. 2, 473--482 (2015; Zbl 1317.35262); \textit{T. K. Wong}, Proc. Am. Math. Soc. 143, No. 3, 1119--1125 (2015; Zbl 1311.35200)]. In [Cao et al., loc. cit.], the authors considered solutions with the invariance structure \(u(t,0,y)=0\) for all \(t\) and \(y\) and proved that for a certain class of initial data (symmetric in \(x\)), the smooth solutions (if exist, and must be symmetric in \(x\)) of the reduced inviscid two-dimensional system above must blow up in a finite time. In [Wong, loc. cit.], by applying the classical invariant transformations, the author obtained a blow-up result that is analogous to the unsteady Prandtl's equations in [\textit{E. Weinan} and \textit{B. Engquist}, Commun. Pure Appl. Math. 50, No. 12, 1287--1293 (1997; Zbl 0908.35099)], and the blow-up does not rely on any symmetry. \newline In this paper, the same invariant transformations and the method of characteristics are applied by the authors to expand the results in [Wong, loc. cit.]. The technical difficulty of this problem is to handle the non-local term arising from the velocity gradient. In order to estimate this term, by a careful and sharp analysis the authors prove the refinement Lemma 2.1, where they find the explicit formula maximizing the \(L^2\) integral in a specific class of functions. Based upon that lemma, they prove Theorem 1.1, where the finite time blow-up of the smooth solutions is obtained for a more general class of initial data.