We consider pointed Lorentzian manifolds and construct canonical foliations by constant mean curvature (CMC) hypersurfaces. Our result assumes a uniform bound on the local sup-norm of the curvature of the manifold and on its local injectivity radius,
only. The prescribed curvature problem under consideration is a nonlinear elliptic equation whose coefficients have limited regularity. The CMC foliation allows us to introduce CMC-harmonic coordinates, in which the coefficients of the Lorentzian metric have optimal regularity.
Considering the isentropic Euler equations of compressible fluid dynamics with geometric effects included, we establish the existence of entropy solutions for a large class of initial data. We cover fluid flows in a nozzle or in spherical symmetry wh
en the origin r=0 is included. These partial differential equations are hyperbolic, but fail to be strictly hyperbolic when the fluid mass density vanishes and vacuum is reached. Furthermore, when geometric effects are taken into account, the sup-norm of solutions can not be controlled since there exist no invariant regions. To overcome these difficulties and to establish an existence theory for solutions with arbitrarily large amplitude, we search for solutions with finite mass and total energy. Our strategy of proof takes advantage of the particular structure of the Euler equations, and leads to a versatile framework covering general compressible fluid problems. We establish first higher-integrability estimates for the mass density and the total energy. Next, we use arguments from the theory of compensated compactness and Young measures, extended here to sequences of solutions with finite mass and total energy. The third ingredient of the proof is a characterization of the unbounded support of entropy admissible Young measures. This requires the study of singular products involving measures and principal values.
We develop a version of Haar and Holmgren methods which applies to discontinuous solutions of nonlinear hyperbolic systems and allows us to control the L1 distance between two entropy solutions. The main difficulty is to cope with linear hyperbolic s
ystems with discontinuous coefficients. Our main observation is that, while entropy solutions contain compressive shocks only, the averaged matrix associated with two such solutions has compressive or undercompressive shocks, but no rarefaction-shocks -- which are recognized as a source for non-uniqueness and instability. Our Haar-Holmgren-type method rests on the geometry associated with the averaged matrix and takes into account adjoint problems and wave cancellations along generalized characteristics. It extends the method proposed earlier by LeFloch et al. for genuinely nonlinear systems. In the present paper, we cover solutions with small total variation and a class of systems with general flux that need not be genuinely nonlinear and includes for instance fluid dynamics equations. We prove that solutions generated by Glimm or front tracking schemes depend continuously in the L1 norm upon their initial data, by exhibiting an L1 functional controling the distance between two solutions.
We consider self-similar approximations of nonlinear hyperbolic systems in one space dimension with Riemann initial data and general diffusion matrix. We assume that the matrix of the system is strictly hyperbolic and the diffusion matrix is close to
the identity. No genuine nonlinearity assumption is required. We show the existence of a smooth, self-similar solution which has bounded total variation, uniformly in the diffusion parameter. In the zero-diffusion limit, the solutions converge to a solution of the Riemann problem associated with the hyperbolic system. A similar result is established for the relaxation approximation and the boundary-value problem in a half-space for the same regularizations.
We review recent work on the local geometry and optimal regularity of Lorentzian manifolds with bounded curvature. Our main results provide an estimate of the injectivity radius of an observer, and a local canonical foliations by CMC (Constant Mean C
urvature) hypersurfaces, together with spatially harmonic coordinates. In contrast with earlier results based on a global bound for derivatives of the curvature, our method requires only a sup-norm bound on the curvature near the given observer.
We consider a class of multidimensional conservation laws with vanishing nonlinear diffusion and dispersion terms. Under a condition on the relative size of the diffusion and dispersion coefficients, we establish that the diffusive-dispersive solutio
ns are uniformly bounded in a space Lp ($p$ arbitrary large, depending on the nonlinearity of the diffusion) and converge to the classical, entropy solution of the corresponding multidimensional, hyperbolic conservation law. Previous results were restricted to one-dimensional equations and specific spaces Lp. Our proof is based on DiPernas uniqueness theorem in the class of entropy measure-valued solutions.
We consider nonlinear hyperbolic conservation laws, posed on a differential (n+1)-manifold with boundary referred to as a spacetime, and in which the flux is defined as a flux field of n-forms depending on a parameter (the unknown variable). We intro
duce a formulation of the initial and boundary value problem which is geometric in nature and is more natural than the vector field approach recently developed for Riemannian manifolds. Our main assumption on the manifold and the flux field is a global hyperbolicity condition, which provides a global time-orientation as is standard in Lorentzian geometry and general relativity. Assuming that the manifold admits a foliation by compact slices, we establish the existence of a semi-group of entropy solutions. Moreover, given any two hypersurfaces with one lying in the future of the other, we establish a contraction property which compares two entropy solutions, in a (geometrically natural) distance equivalent to the L1 distance. To carry out the proofs, we rely on a new version of the finite volume method, which only requires the knowledge of the given n-volume form structure on the (n+1)-manifold and involves the {sl total flux} across faces of the elements of the triangulations, only, rather than the product of a numerical flux times the measure of that face.
We introduce a formulation of the initial and boundary value problem for nonlinear hyperbolic conservation laws posed on a differential manifold endowed with a volume form, possibly with a boundary; in particular, this includes the important case of
Lorentzian manifolds. Only limited regularity is assumed on the geometry of the manifold. For this problem, we establish the existence and uniqueness of an L1 semi-group of weak solutions satisfying suitable entropy and boundary conditions.
Solutions to conservation laws satisfy the monotonicity property: the number of local extrema is a non-increasing function of time, and local maximum/minimum values decrease/increase monotonically in time. This paper investigates this property from a
numerical standpoint. We introduce a class of fully discrete in space and time, high order accurate, difference schemes, called generalized monotone schemes. Convergence toward the entropy solution is proven via a new technique of proof, assuming that the initial data has a finite number of extremum values only, and the flux-function is strictly convex. We define discrete paths of extrema by tracking local extremum values in the approximate solution. In the course of the analysis we establish the pointwise convergence of the trace of the solution along a path of extremum. As a corollary, we obtain a proof of convergence for a MUSCL-type scheme being second order accurate away from sonic points and extrema.
