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Matzoh ball soup revisited: the boundary regularity issue. (English) Zbl 1279.35062

Summary: We consider nonlinear diffusion equations of the form \(\partial_t u=\Delta\phi(u)\) in \(\mathbb{R}^N\) with \(N\geq 2\). When \(\phi(s)\equiv s\), this is just the heat equation. Let \(\Omega\) be a domain in \(\mathbb{R}^N\), where \(\partial\Omega\) is bounded and \(\partial\Omega= \partial(\mathbb{R}^N\setminus\overline\Omega)\). We consider the initial-boundary value problem, where the initial value equals zero and the boundary value equals \(1\), and the Cauchy problem where the initial data is the characteristic function of the set \(\Omega^c= \mathbb{R}^N\setminus\Omega\). We settle the boundary regularity issue for the characterization of the sphere as a stationary level surface of the solution \(u\), no regularity assumption is needed for \(\partial\Omega\).

MSC:

35K59 Quasilinear parabolic equations
35B06 Symmetries, invariants, etc. in context of PDEs
35K15 Initial value problems for second-order parabolic equations
35K20 Initial-boundary value problems for second-order parabolic equations

References:

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