(1) Department of Mathematical Sciences, University of Alabama in Huntsville, Huntsville, AL 35899, USA
Abstract:
We investigate the existence of traveling wave solutions for a system of reaction–diffusion equations that has been used as a model for microbial growth in a flow reactor and for the diffusive epidemic population. The existence of traveling waves was conjectured early but only has been proved recently for sufficiently small diffusion coefficient by the singular perturbation technique. In this paper we show the existence of traveling waves for an arbitrary diffusion coefficient. Our approach is a shooting method with the aid of an appropriately constructed Liapunov function.Dedicated to Professor Shui-Nee Chow on the occasion of his 60th birthday.Wenzhang Huang-Research was supported in part by NSF Grant DMS-0204676.