Companion paper for Well posedness of general cross-diffusion systems

TL;DR

This paper discusses the mathematical analysis of general cross-diffusion systems, focusing on solution uniqueness and maximum principle without relying on entropic structure, and highlights where classical methods face limitations.

Contribution

It provides clarifications on the limitations of classical analysis tools in establishing well-posedness for cross-diffusion systems without entropic assumptions.

Findings

Controlled diffusion coefficient ratios improve solution regularity

Adaptation of Meyer's technique for nonlinear parabolic systems

Identification of limitations of classical analysis methods

Abstract

The paper entitled "Well posedness of general cross-diffusion systems", by C. Choquet, C. Rosier, L. Rosier, J. Diff. Eq. 2021, is devoted to the mathematical analysis of the Cauchy problem for general cross-diffusion systems without any assumption about its entropic structure. The absence of this type of hypothesis is strongly felt for two questions: the uniqueness of the solution, despite the nonlinear coupling of the highest derivatives terms, and the maximum principle. The article is therefore largely devoted to these two points. The answers are provided at the cost of certain assumptions or technicalities, mainly: (i) the ratios between the diffusion and cross-diffusion coefficients has to be drastically controlled for sufficiently enhancing the regularity of the solution, namely its gradient belongs to the space $ L ^ 4 ((0,T)\times \Omega )$; the regularity is obtained by adapting the classical Meyer's to the nonlinear parabolic setting under consideration ; (ii) the source terms have to ensure the confinement of the solution. The present "companion" paper aims at showing where more classical analysis tools fail to solve these questions and gives some additional clarifications.