Invariant sets for strongly coupled reaction-diffusion systems under general boundary conditions (Q910573)

Let G be an open connected set in \({\mathbb{R}}^{n+1}\), and denote by \(G_ p\) the parabolic interior and by \(\Gamma =\Sigma_ 1\cup \Sigma_ 2\), \(\Sigma_ 1\cap \Sigma_ 2=\emptyset\), the parabolic boundary of the closure \(\bar G.\) Consider the strongly coupled system of semilinear reaction-diffusion equations \[ (1a)\quad u_ t=A(t,x)Lu+f(t,x,u,u_ x)\;in\;G_ p, \] under initial boundary conditions \[ (1b)\quad u=\phi \;on\;\Sigma_ 1,\quad Bu_{\gamma}=g(t,x,u)\;on\;\Sigma_ 2. \] Here, \(u=(u^ 1,...,u^ m)\) is vector-valued with outward directional derivative \(u_{\gamma}\), L is a scalar elliptic operator of second order acting componentwise on u, and A, B are \((m\times m)\)-matrices. Let \(S\subset {\mathbb{R}}^ m\) be a convex set defined by \(S=\{z:\) \(K^{(i)}(z)\leq 0\) for \(1\leq i\leq \kappa \}\) with some \(\kappa\in {\mathbb{N}}\) and given smooth functions \(K^{(i)}\). It is shown that, under appropriate conditions on g, f, A, B and the \(K^{(i)}\), the set S is positively invariant for (1), i.e. that \(u(\Sigma_ 1)\subset S\) implies \(u(\bar G)\subset S.\) The proof relies on differential inequality methods.