Particle approximation of the one dimensional Keller-Segel equation, stability and rigidity of the blow-up

We investigate a particle system which is a discrete and deterministic approximation of the one-dimensional Keller-Segel equation with a logarithmic potential. The particle system is derived from the gradient flow of the homogeneous free energy written in Lagrangian coordinates. We focus on the description of the blow-up of the particle system, namely: the number of particles involved in the first aggregate, and the limiting profile of the rescaled system. We exhibit basins of stability for which the number of particles is critical, and we prove a weak rigidity result concerning the rescaled dynamics. This work is complemented with a detailed analysis of the case where only three particles interact

The sharp-interface limit for the Navier--Stokes--Korteweg equations

We investigate the sharp-interface limit for the Navier--Stokes--Korteweg model, which is an extension of the compressible Navier--Stokes equations. By means of compactness arguments, we show that solutions of the Navier--Stokes--Korteweg equations converge to solutions of a physically meaningful free-boundary problem. Assuming that an associated energy functional converges in a suitable sense, we obtain the sharp-interface limit at the level of weak solutions

Qualitative behavior of solutions for thermodynamically consistent Stefan problems with surface tension

The qualitative behavior of a thermodynamically consistent two-phase Stefan problem with surface tension and with or without kinetic undercooling is studied. It is shown that these problems generate local semiflows in well-defined state manifolds. If a solution does not exhibit singularities in a sense made precise below, it is proved that it exists globally in time and its orbit is relatively compact. In addition, stability and instability of equilibria is studied. In particular, it is shown that multiple spheres of the same radius are unstable, reminiscent of the onset of Ostwald ripening.Comment: 56 pages. Expanded introduction, added references. This revised version is published in Arch. Ration. Mech. Anal. (207) (2013), 611-66

A regularity theory for intrinsic minimising fractional harmonic maps

We define and develop an interior partial regularity theory for intrinsic energy minimising fractional harmonic maps from Euclidean space into smooth compact Riemannian manifolds for fractional powers strictly between zero and one. Intrinsic fractional harmonic maps are critical points of an energy whose first variation is a Dirichlet to Neumann map for the harmonic map problem on a half-space with a Riemannian metric which can degenerate/become singular along the boundary, depending on the fractional power. Similarly to the approach used to prove regularity for stationary intrinsic semi-harmonic maps, we take advantage of the connection between fractional harmonic maps and free boundary problems for harmonic maps in order to develop a partial regularity theory for the fractional harmonic maps we consider. In particular, we prove partial regularity for locally minimising harmonic maps with (partially) free boundary data on half-spaces with the aforementioned metrics up to the boundary; fractional harmonic maps then inherit this regularity. As a by-product of our methods we shed some new light on the monotonicity of the average energy of solutions of the degenerate linear elliptic equation related to fractional harmonic functions