This paper is devoted to a functional analytic approach to the subelliptic oblique derivative problem for the usual Laplacian with a complex parameter λ. We solve the long-standing open problem of the asymptotic eigenvalue distribution for the homogeneous oblique derivative problem when |λ| tends to ∞. We prove the spectral properties of the closed realization of the Laplacian similar to the elliptic (non-degenerate) case. In the proof we make use of Boutet de Monvel calculus in order to study the resolvents and their adjoints in the framework of L2 Sobolev spaces.

A review is presented of recent results on front propagation in reaction-diffusion-advection equations in homogeneous and heterogeneous media. Formal asymptotic expansions and heuristic ideas are used to motivate the results wherever possible. The fronts include constant-speed monotone traveling fronts in homogeneous media, periodically varying traveling fronts in periodic media, and fluctuating and fractal fronts in random media. These fronts arise in a wide range of applications such as chemical kinetics, combustion, biology, transport in porous media, and industrial deposition processes. Open problems are briefly discussed along the way.

This paper investigates the generalized Keller-Segel (KS) system with a nonlocal diffusion term -ν(-Δ) α/2 ρ (1 < α < 2). Firstly, the global existence of weak solutions is proved for the initial density ρ0 ∈ L01∩L d/α (60d) (d ≥ 2) with [norm of matrix]ρ0[norm of matrix] d/α < K, where K is a universal constant only depending on d, α, ν. Moreover, the conservation of mass holds true and the weak solution satisfies some hyper-contractive and decay estimates in Lr for any 1 < r < ∞. Secondly, for the more general initial data ρ0 ∈ L01 ∩ L05(60d) (d = 2, 3), the local existence is obtained. Thirdly, for ρ0 ∈ L01 (60d; (1 + |x|)dx ∩ L∞(60d)( d ≥ 2) with [norm of matrix]ρ0[norm of matrix]d/α < K, we prove the uniqueness and stability of weak solutions under Wasserstein metric through the method of associating the KS equation with a self-consistent stochastic process driven by the rotationally invariant α-stable Lévy process Lα(t). Also, we prove the weak solution is L1 bounded uniformly in time. Lastly, we consider the N-particle interacting system with the Lévy process Lα(t) and the Newtonian potential aggregation and prove that the expectation of collision time between particles is below a universal constant if the moment ∫60d |x| γρ0dx for some 1 < γ < α is below a universal constant K γ and ν is also below a universal constant. Meanwhile, we prove the propagation of chaos as N → ∞ for the interacting particle system with a cut-off parameter ε ~ (ln N)-1/d, and show that the mean field limit equation is exactly the generalized KS equation.

In this paper, the local well-posedness of strong solutions to the Cauchy problem of the isentropic compressible Navier-Stokes equations is proved with the initial date being allowed to have vacuum. The main contribution of this paper is that the well-posedness is established without assuming any compatibility condition on the initial data, which was widely used before in many literatures concerning the well-posedness of compressible Navier-Stokes equations in the presence of vacuum.

In this paper, we consider the compressible NavierStokes equations for isentropic flow of finite total mass when the initial density is either of compact or infinite support. The viscosity coefficient is assumed to be a power function of the density so that the Cauchy problem is well-posed. New global existence results are established when the density function connects to the vacuum states continuously. For this, some new <i>a priori</i> estimates are obtained to take care of the degeneracy of the viscosity coefficient at vacuum. We will also give a non-global existence theorem of regular solutions when the initial data are of compact support in Eulerian coordinates which implies singularity forms at the interface separating the gas and vacuum.