Variational Inequalities of Navier--Stokes Type with Time Dependent Constraints

TL;DR

This paper studies a class of parabolic variational inequalities related to Navier--Stokes equations with time-dependent obstacles, proposing approximation methods and a new approach to handle nonlinear convection terms.

Contribution

It introduces a novel approximation scheme for Navier--Stokes variational inequalities with time-dependent obstacles and a new method to address the nonlinear convection term.

Findings

Established existence of solutions via approximation sequences.

Developed a new approach for nonlinear convection term handling.

Proved convergence of approximate obstacle problems.

Abstract

We consider a class of parabolic variational inequalities with time dependent obstacle of the form $|{\boldsymbol u}(x,t)| \le p(x,t)$, where ${\boldsymbol u}$ is the velocity field of a fluid governed by the Navier--Stokes variational inequality. The obstacle function $p=p(x,t)$ imposed on ${\boldsymbol u}$ consists of three parts which are respectively the degenerate part $p(x,t)=0$, the finitely positive part $0< p(x,t) <\infty$ and singular part $p(x,t)=\infty$. In this paper, we shall propose a sequence of approximate obstacle problems with everywhere finitely positive obstacles and prove an existence result for the original problem by discussing the convergence of the approximate problems. The crucial step is to handle the nonlinear convection term. In this paper we propose a new approach to it.