Pinning and mode-locking of reaction fronts by vortices

We present results of experiments on the behavior of reaction fronts in the presence of vortex-dominated flows. The flow is either a single vortex or a chain of vortices in an annular configuration, and the reaction is the excitable Belousov–Zhabotinsky chemical reaction. If the vortex chain oscillates periodically in the lateral direction, the reaction front often mode-locks to the oscillations, propagating an integer number of wavelengths of the flow (two vortices) in an integer number of drive periods. In the presence of a uniform “wind”, the front often freezes, remaining pinned to the leading vortex and neither propagating forward against the wind nor being blown backward by it. Studies with an individual vortex verify the ability of a moving vortex to pin and drag a reaction front. We use this pinning behavior to explain the mode-locking for the oscillating case.     

Traveling fronts of the volume-filling chemotaxis model with general kinetics

This paper is devoted to the study of traveling fronts for the volume-filling chemotaxis model with general kinetics by applying the perturbation method. The proof relies on the Fredholm theory and the Banach contractive mapping principle. The obtained results can easily detect the existence of traveling fronts for some models investigated in the known references.     

Nonlinear stability of traveling wave fronts for delayed reaction diffusion systems

This paper is concerned with nonlinear stability of traveling wave fronts for a delayed reaction diffusion system. We prove that the traveling wave front is exponentially stable to perturbation in some exponentially weighted L^∞ spaces, when the difference between initial data and traveling wave front decays exponentially as x→−∞, but the initial data can be suitable large in other locations. Moreover, the time decay rates are obtained by weighted energy estimates.     

A stochastic model for fronts in porous media

We analyze a stochastic model for the motion of fronts in two-phase fluids and derive upscaled equations for the capillary pressure. This extends results of [11], where the same law for the capillary pressure was derived under an assumption on typical explosion patterns. With the work at hand we remove that assumption and show that in the stochastic case the upscaled equations hold almost surely.     

Pulsating fronts and front-like entire solutions for a reaction–advection–diffusion competition model in a periodic habitat

This paper is devoted to the study of pulsating fronts and pulsating front-like entire solutions for a reaction–advection–diffusion model of two competing species in a periodic habitat. Under certain assumptions, the competition system admits a leftward and a rightward pulsating fronts in the bistable case. In this work we construct some other types of entire solutions by interacting the leftward and rightward pulsating fronts. Some of these entire solutions behave as the two pulsating fronts approaching each other from both sides of the x-axis, which turn out to be unique and Liapunov stable 2-dimensional manifolds of solutions, furthermore, the leftward and rightward pulsating fronts are on the boundary of these 2-dimensional manifolds. The others behave as the two pulsating fronts propagating from one side of the x-axis, the faster one then invades the slower one as $t\to +\infty$. These kinds of pulsating front-like entire solutions then provide some new spreading ways other than pulsating fronts for two strongly competing species interacting in a heterogeneous habitat.     

Numerical simulation of a two-phase melt spinning model

We consider a two-phase model of melt spinning including flow induced crystallization. Introducing slight modifications in the model we perform numerical simulations on it. We present comparison of our velocity profiles with the experimental profiles provided by the company Freudenberg & Co.     

Traveling wave fronts in a delayed population model of Daphnia magna

This paper deals with the traveling wave fronts of a delayed population model with nonlocal dispersal. By constructing proper upper and lower solutions, the existence of the traveling wave fronts is proved. In particular, we show such a traveling wave front is strictly monotone.     

Travelling wave fronts in a vector disease model with delay

In this paper, we study the diffusive vector disease model with delay. This problem with strong biological background has attracted much research attention. We focus on the existence of traveling wave fronts, and find that there is a moving zone for the transition from the disease-free state to the infective state. To complete the theoretical analysis, we employ the mathematical tools including the monotone iteration technique as well as the upper and lower solution method.     

Monotone travelling fronts of a food-limited population model with nonlocal delay

This paper deals with the existence of monotone travelling fronts of a diffusive food-limited population model with nonlocal delay. By choosing different kernel functions, we establish some existence criteria of monotone travelling fronts connecting two uniform steady states of the model, which include, improve and/or complement a number of existing results.     

Existence and stability of traveling wave fronts in reaction advection diffusion equations with nonlocal delay

This paper is concerned with the existence, uniqueness and globally asymptotic stability of traveling wave fronts in the quasi-monotone reaction advection diffusion equations with nonlocal delay. Under bistable assumption, we construct various pairs of super- and subsolutions and employ the comparison principle and the squeezing technique to prove that the equation has a unique nondecreasing traveling wave front (up to translation), which is monotonically increasing and globally asymptotically stable with phase shift. The influence of advection on the propagation speed is also considered. Comparing with the previous results, our results recovers and/or improves a number of existing ones. In particular, these results can be applied to a reaction advection diffusion equation with nonlocal delayed effect and a diffusion population model with distributed maturation delay, some new results are obtained.     

A geometric approach to fingering instabilities for reaction fronts in fully coupled geochemical systems

A geometrical approach described by Grindrod (1995, Proc. R.Soc. Lond. A 449, 123–38) is applied to analyse spontaneoussymmetry breaking of planar reaction fronts in fully coupledreaction-diffusion-advection problems arising in geochemistry.This method yields stability results qualitatively similar tothose of Ortoleva et al. (1987, Am. J. Sci287, 1008–40)and Chen & Ortoleva (1990, Earth Sci. Rev. 29, 183–98;1992, Modelling and Analysis of Diffusive and Advective Processesin Geosciences, SIAM), yet distinct in the treatment of large-wavenumberperturbations. The analysis is verified numerically.     

Evans functions and bifurcations of standing wave fronts of a nonlinear system of reaction diffusion equations

Consider the following nonlinear system of reaction diffusion equations arising from mathematical neuroscience $\frac{\partial u}{\partial t}=\frac{\partial^2u}{\partial x^2}+\alpha[\beta H(u-\theta)-u]-w,~ \frac{\partial w}{\partial t}=\varepsilon(u-\gamma w).$ Also consider the nonlinear scalar reaction diffusion equation $\frac{\partial u}{\partial t}=\frac{\partial^2u}{\partial x^2}+\alpha[\beta H(u-\theta)-u].$ In these model equations, $\alpha>0$, $\beta>0$, $\gamma>0$, $\varepsilon>0$ and $\theta>0$ are positive constants, such that $0<2\theta<\beta$. In the model equations, $u=u(x,t)$ represents the membrane potential of a neuron at position $x$ and time $t$, $w=w(x,t)$ represents the leaking current, a slow process that controls the excitation.\\indent The main purpose of this paper is to couple together linearized stability criterion (the equivalence of the nonlinear stability, the linear stability and the spectral stability of the standing wave fronts) and Evans functions (complex analytic functions) to establish the existence, stability, instability and bifurcations of standing wave fronts of the nonlinear system of reaction diffusion equations and to establish the existence and stability of the standing wave fronts of the nonlinear scalar reaction diffusion equation.     

Spreading and vanishing in a West Nile virus model with expanding fronts

We study a simplified version of a West Nile virus(WNv) model discussed by Lewis et al.(2006),which was considered as a first approximation for the spatial spread of WNv. The basic reproduction number R_0 for the non-spatial epidemic model is defined and a threshold parameter R_0~D for the corresponding problem with null Dirichlet boundary condition is introduced. We consider a free boundary problem with a coupled system, which describes the diffusion of birds by a PDE and the movement of mosquitoes by an ODE. The risk index R_0~F(t) associated with the disease in spatial setting is represented. Sufficient conditions for the WNv to eradicate or to spread are given. The asymptotic behavior of the solution to the system when the spreading occurs is considered. It is shown that the initial number of infected populations, the diffusion rate of birds and the length of initial habitat exhibit important impacts on the vanishing or spreading of the virus. Numerical simulations are presented to illustrate the analytical results.     

Existence of travelling fronts in a diffusive vector disease model with spatio-temporal delay

In this paper, we study travelling front solutions of a vector disease model incorporating time delays and diffusion. Special attention is paid to the modelling of the time delays to incorporate the associated non-local spatial terms which account for the drift of individuals to their present positions from their possible positions at previous times. We shall show that such fronts exist for the weak generic delay kernel and sufficiently small delays by using geometric singular perturbation theory. Then, for the discrete-delay case, following Canosa’s asymptotic analysis method, we give some information on travelling front solutions.     

Evolutes of fronts in the Minkowski plane

We consider the differential geometry of evolutes of singular curves and give the definitions of spacelike fronts and timelike fronts in the Minkowski plane. We also give the notions of moving frames along the non‐lightlike fronts in the Minkowski plane. By using the moving frames, we define the evolutes of non‐lightlike fronts and investigate the geometric properties of these evolutes. We obtain that the evolute of a spacelike front is a timelike front and the evolute of a timelike front is a spacelike front. Since the evolute of a non‐lightlike front is also a non‐lightlike front, we can take evolute again. We study the Minkowski Zigzag number of non‐lightlike fronts and give the n‐th evolute of the non‐lightlike front. Finally, we give an example to illustrate our results.     

Dynamics of water evaporation fronts

The evolution and shapes of water evaporation fronts caused by long-wave instability of vertical flows with a phase transition in extended two-dimensional horizontal porous domains are analyzed numerically. The plane surface of the phase transition loses stability when the wave number becomes infinite or zero. In the latter case, the transition to instability is accompanied with reversible bifurcations in a subcritical neighborhood of the instability threshold and by the formation of secondary (not necessarily horizontal homogeneous) flows. An example of motion in a porous medium is considered concerning the instability of a water layer lying above a mixture of air and vapor filling a porous layer under isothermal conditions in the presence of capillary forces acting on the phase transition interface.