We study the limiting behavior of viscous incompressible flows when the fluid domain is allowed to expand as the viscosity vanishes. We describe precise conditions under which the limiting flow satisfies the full space Euler equations. The argument i
s based on truncation and on energy estimates, following the structure of the proof of Katos criterion for the vanishing viscosity limit. This work complements previous work by the authors, see [Kelliher, Comm. Math. Phys. 278 (2008), 753-773] and [arXiv:0801.4935v1].
In this article we consider viscous flow in the exterior of an obstacle satisfying the standard no-slip boundary condition at the surface of the obstacle. We seek conditions under which solutions of the Navier-Stokes system in the exterior domain con
verge to solutions of the Euler system in the full space when both viscosity and the size of the obstacle vanish. We prove that this convergence is true assuming two hypothesis: first, that the initial exterior domain velocity converges strongly in $L^2$ to the full-space initial velocity and second, that the diameter of the obstacle is smaller than a suitable constant times viscosity, or, in other words, that the obstacle is sufficiently small. The convergence holds as long as the solution to the limit problem is known to exist and stays sufficiently smooth. This work complements the study of incompressible flow around small obstacles, which has been carried out in [1,2,3] [1] D. Iftimie and J. Kelliher, {it Remarks on the vanishing obstacle limit for a 3D viscous incompressible fluid.} Preprint available at http://math.univ-lyon1.fr/~iftimie/ARTICLES/viscoushrink3d.pdf . [2] D. Iftimie, M. C. Lopes Filho, and H. J. Nussenzveig Lopes. {it Two dimensional incompressible ideal flow around a small obstacle.} Comm. Partial Differential Equations {bf 28} (2003), no. 1-2, 349--379. [3] D. Iftimie, M. C. Lopes Filho, and H. J. Nussenzveig Lopes. {it Two dimensional incompressible viscous flow around a small obstacle.} Math. Ann. {bf 336} (2006), no. 2, 449--489.
We continue the work of Lopes Filho, Mazzucato and Nussenzveig Lopes [LMN], on the vanishing viscosity limit of circularly symmetric viscous flow in a disk with rotating boundary, shown there to converge to the inviscid limit in $L^2$-norm as long as
the prescribed angular velocity $alpha(t)$ of the boundary has bounded total variation. Here we establish convergence in stronger $L^2$ and $L^p$-Sobolev spaces, allow for more singular angular velocities $alpha$, and address the issue of analyzing the behavior of the boundary layer. This includes an analysis of concentration of vorticity in the vanishing viscosity limit. We also consider such flows on an annulus, whose two boundary components rotate independently. [LMN] Lopes Filho, M. C., Mazzucato, A. L. and Nussenzveig Lopes, H. J., Vanishing viscosity limit for incompressible flow inside a rotating circle, preprint 2006.
