Vortex dynamics for the Ginzburg-Landau equation with Neumann condition (Q701672)

The subject of the paper is the Ginzburg-Landau (GL) equation with real coefficients, \[ u_t = \Delta u + \varepsilon^{-2}(1 - |u|^2)u = 0, \] which governs evolution of a complex function \(u(x,y,t)\) (which has the meaning of the order parameter in the application to superconductors), and \(\Delta\) is the Laplacian acting on the coordinates \(x\) and \(y\). The GL equation is considered in a finite domain, and is supplemented by the Neumann boundary conditions (b.c.). In the global analysis of dynamics of the order-parameter field, the most important role is played by motion of zeros of \(|u(x,y,t)|\), each corresponding to an Abrikosov vortex, in terms of superconductivity. In earlier works, a system of ODEs was derived for the motion of a system of far separated vortices. The form of that system depends on the type b.c., being different for the Neumann case in comparison with the case of the Dirichlet b.c. In this work, a proof is developed which shows that, in the case when the parameter \(\varepsilon\) in the GL equation is small, a general solution to the equation with the Neumann b.c. indeed gives rise to motion of zeros of the field \(|u|\) which asymptotically coincides, in the limit of \(\varepsilon \to 0\), with the motion predicted by the above-mentioned ODE system. The proof is based on analysis of singularities (which correspond to the vortices) of harmonic maps.