Qualitative analysis of steady states to the Sel'kov model

In this work, we are concerned with a reaction-diffusion system well known as the Sel'kov model, which has been used for the study of morphogenesis, population dynamics and autocatalytic oxidation reactions. We derive some further analytic results for the steady states to this model. In particular, we show that no nonconstant positive steady state exists if 0<p?1 and θ is large, which provides a sharp contrast to the case of p>1 and large θ, where nonconstant positive steady states can occur. Thus, these conclusions indicate that the parameter p plays a crucial role in leading to spatially nonhomogeneous distribution of the two reactants. The a priori estimates are fundamental to our mathematical approaches.     

Loops and branches of coexistence states in a Lotka-Volterra competition model

A two-species Lotka-Volterra competition-diffusion model with spatially inhomogeneous reaction terms is investigated. The two species are assumed to be identical except for their interspecific competition coefficients. Viewing their common diffusion rate μ as a parameter, we describe the bifurcation diagram of the steady states, including stability, in terms of two real functions of μ. We also show that the bifurcation diagram can be rather complicated. Namely, given any two positive integers l and b, the interspecific competition coefficients can be chosen such that there exist at least l bifurcating branches of positive stable steady states which connect two semi-trivial steady states of the same type (they vanish at the same component), and at least b other bifurcating branches of positive stable steady states that connect semi-trivial steady states of different types.     

Non-constant positive steady states of the Sel'kov model

This paper deals with the reaction-diffusion system known as the Sel'kov model with the homogeneous Neumann boundary condition. This model has been applied to various problems in chemistry and biology. We first give a priori estimates (positive upper and lower bounds) of positive steady states, and then study the non-existence, bifurcation and global existence of non-constant positive steady states as the parameters λ and θ are varied.     

Properties of positive solutions to an elliptic equation with negative exponent

In this paper, we study some quantitative properties of positive solutions to a singular elliptic equation with negative power on the bounded smooth domain or in the whole Euclidean space. Our model arises in the study of the steady states of thin films and other applied physics as well as differential geometry. We can get some useful local gradient estimate and L¹ lower bound for positive solutions of the elliptic equation. A uniform positive lower bound for convex positive solutions is also obtained. We show that in lower dimensions, there is no stable positive solutions in the whole space. In the whole space of dimension two, we can show that there is no positive smooth solution with finite Morse index. Symmetry properties of related integral equations are also given.     

Disguised toric dynamical systems

We study families of polynomial dynamical systems inspired by biochemical reaction networks. We focus on complex balanced mass-action systems, which have also been called toric. They are known or conjectured to enjoy very strong dynamical properties, such as existence and uniqueness of positive steady states, local and global stability, persistence, and permanence. We consider the class of disguised toric dynamical systems, which contains toric dynamical systems, and to which all dynamical properties mentioned above extend naturally. By means of (real) algebraic geometry we show that some reaction networks have an empty toric locus or a toric locus of Lebesgue measure zero in parameter space, while their disguised toric locus is of positive measure. We also propose some algorithms one can use to detect the disguised toric locus.     

Existence and instability of steady states for a triangular cross-diffusion system: A computer-assisted proof

In this paper, we present and apply a computer-assisted method to study steady states of a triangular cross-diffusion system. Our approach consist in an a posteriori validation procedure, that is based on using a fixed point argument around a numerically computed solution, in the spirit of the Newton–Kantorovich theorem. It allows to prove the existence of various non homogeneous steady states for different parameter values. In some situations, we obtain as many as 13 coexisting steady states. We also apply the a posteriori validation procedure to study the linear stability of the obtained steady states, proving that many of them are in fact unstable.     

A fourth-order parabolic equation modeling epitaxial thin film growth

We study the continuum model for epitaxial thin film growth from Phys. D 132 (1999) 520-542, which is known to simulate experimentally observed dynamics very well. We show existence, uniqueness and regularity of solutions in an appropriate function space, and we characterize the existence of nontrivial equilibria in terms of the size of the underlying domain. In an investigation of asymptotical behavior, we give a weak assumption under which the ω-limit set of the dynamical system consists only of steady states. In the one-dimensional setting we can characterize the set of steady states and determine its unique asymptotically stable element. The article closes with some illustrative numerical examples.     

Steady states in a structured epidemic model with Wentzell boundary condition

We introduce a non-linear structured population model with diffusion in the state space. Individuals are structured with respect to a continuous variable which represents a pathogen load. The class of uninfected individuals constitutes a special compartment that carries mass; hence the model is equipped with generalized Wentzell (or dynamic) boundary conditions. Our model is intended to describe the spread of infection of a vertically transmitted disease, for e.g., Wolbachia in a mosquito population. Therefore, the (infinite dimensional) non-linearity arises in the recruitment term. First, we establish global existence of solutions and the principle of linearised stability for our model. Then, in our main result, we formulate simple conditions which guarantee the existence of non-trivial steady states of the model. Our method utilises an operator theoretic framework combined with a fixed-point approach. Finally in the last section, we establish a sufficient condition for the local asymptotic stability of the positive steady state.     

Stability of spiky solution of Keller–Segel's minimal chemotaxis model

A huge volume of research has been done for the simplest chemotaxis model (Keller–Segel's minimal model) and its variants, yet, some of the basic issues remain unresolved until now. For example, it is known that the minimal model has spiky steady states that can be used to model the important cell aggregation phenomenon, but the stability of monotone spiky steady states was not shown. In this paper, we derive, first formally and then rigorously, the asymptotic expansion of these monotone steady states, and then we use this fine information on the spike to prove its local asymptotic stability. Moreover, we obtain the uniqueness of such steady states. We expect that the new ideas and techniques for rigorous asymptotic expansion and spectrum analysis presented in this paper will be useful in attacking and hence stimulating research on other more sophisticated chemotaxis models.     

Positive Steady States of a Prey-predator Model with Diffusion and Non-monotone Conversion Rate

In this paper, we study the positive steady states of a prey-predator model with diffusion throughout and a non-monotone conversion rate under the homogeneous Dirichlet boundary condition. We obtain some results of the existence and non-existence of positive steady states. The stability and uniqueness of positive steady states are also discussed.     

Asymptotic profiles of positive steady states for a diffusive predator–prey model with predator interference

This paper is concerned with positive steady states for a diffusive predator–prey model with predator interference in a spatially heterogeneous environment. We first establish the necessary and sufficient conditions for the existence of positive steady states. In order to get a better understanding of the structure of positive steady states, we further investigate the asymptotic profiles of positive steady states as some parameter tends to zero or infinity.     

Turing pattern of the Oregonator model

The Oregonator model is the mathematical dynamics which describes the Field-Körös-Noyes mechanics of the famous Belousov-Zhabotinskii? reaction. In this work, we establish some fundamental analytic properties of this dynamics and its corresponding steady state. Under various conditions on the parameters and the size of the reactor, we examine the existence and non-existence of non-constant steady states. In particular, for some properly chosen parameter ranges, we prove the occurrence of the Turing pattern generated by this Oregonator model. Our results exhibit interesting and very different roles of the diffusion rates and the reactor in the formation of the Turing pattern. Our mathematical analysis mainly relies on a priori estimates and the topological degree argument.     

Global indeterminacy of the equilibrium in the Chamley model of endogenous growth in the vicinity of a Bogdanov–Takens bifurcation

This paper studies the dynamics implied by the Chamley (1993) model, a variant of the two-sector model with an implicit characterization of the learning function. We first show that under some “regularity” conditions regarding the learning function, the model has (a) one steady state, (b) no steady states or (c) two steady states (one saddle and one non-saddle). Moreover, via the Bogdanov–Takens theorem, we prove that for critical regions of the parameters space, the dynamics undergoes a particular global phenomenon, namely the homoclinic bifurcation. Because these findings imply the existence of a continuum of equilibrium trajectories, all departing from the same initial value of the predetermined variable, the model exhibits global indeterminacy.     

Stability of an age-structured epidemiological model for hepatitis C

This article introduces an age-structured epidemiological model for the disease transmission dynamics of hepatitis C. We first show that the infection-free steady state is locally and globally asymptotically stable if the basic reproductive number ? ₀ is below one, in this case, the disease always dies out, then we prove that at least one endemic steady state exists when the reproductive number ? ₀ is above one, the stability conditions for the endemic steady states are also given.     

Digital simulation of thermal reactions

Simulations of the equation for thermal expansion of a reacting gas have been carried out, exploring both the (possible) steady states and time-marching solutions. The critical Frank-Kamenetskii parameter δ_cr has been evaluated to seven decimal places for the slab, cylinder and spherical geometries and the role of the critical activation parameter ? was explored. It was found that there exist one or more mathematical steady states for any δ if ?>0, the curves for steady temperature at the center of the geometry plotted against δ tending to a straight line at large δ. Critical values of ?, the values above which this plot has a single solution for a given δ, have been computed to eight decimals. Time marching simulations showed that the Crank-Nicolson method, applied consistently, produces very accurate results, compared with the implementation in which the nonlinear term is rendered explicit. Where for a given δ there are several mathematical steady states, a time march usually settles on the lowest such state (if it settles at all), regardless of where the simulation is started, within the possible limits. The mathematical multiple steady states are not attained by time marching simulations, and are also physically unlikely.     

Turing patterns of a strongly coupled predator-prey system with diffusion effects

The main purpose of this work is to investigate the effects of cross-diffusion in a strongly coupled predator-prey system. By a linear stability analysis we find the conditions which allow a homogeneous steady state (stable for the kinetics) to become unstable through a Turing mechanism. In particular, it is shown that Turing instability of the reaction-diffusion system can disappear due to the presence of the cross-diffusion, which implies that the cross-diffusion induced stability can be regarded as the cross-stability of the corresponding reaction-diffusion system. Furthermore, we consider the existence and non-existence results concerning non-constant positive steady states (patterns) of the system. We demonstrate that cross-diffusion can create non-constant positive steady-state solutions. These results exhibit interesting and very different roles of the cross-diffusion in the formation and the disappearance of the Turing instability.     

Bifurcation analysis on a diffusive Holling–Tanner predator–prey model

This paper is concerned with a diffusive Holling–Tanner predator–prey model subject to homogeneous Neumann boundary condition. By choosing the ratio of intrinsic growth rates of predator to prey λ as the bifurcation parameter, we find that spatially homogeneous and non-homogeneous Hopf bifurcation occur at the positive constant steady state as λ varies. The steady state bifurcation of simple and double eigenvalues are intensively investigated. The techniques of space decomposition and the implicit function theorem are adopted to deal with the case of double eigenvalues. Our results show that this model can exhibit spatially non-homogeneous periodic and stationary patterns induced by the parameter λ. Numerical simulations are presented to illustrate our theoretical results.     

Exact multiplicity of solutions and S-shaped bifurcation curve for a class of semilinear elliptic equations

The set of steady state solutions to a reaction-diffusion equation modeling an autocatalytic chemical reaction is completely determined, when the reactor has spherical geometry, and the spatial dimension is n=1 or 2 for any reaction order, or n?3 for subcritical reaction order. Bifurcation approach and analysis of linearized problems are used to establish exact multiplicity and precise global bifurcation diagram of positive steady states.