Existence of Compactly Supported Global Minimisers for the Interaction Energy

The existence of compactly supported global minimisers for continuum models of particles interacting through a potential is shown under almost optimal hypotheses. The main assumption on the potential is that it is catastrophic, or not H-stable, which is the complementary assumption to that in classical results on thermodynamic limits in statistical mechanics. The proof is based on a uniform control on the local mass around each point of the support of a global minimiser, together with an estimate on the size of the "gaps" it may have. The class of potentials for which we prove existence of global minimisers includes power-law potentials and, for some range of parameters, Morse potentials, widely used in applications. We also show that the support of local minimisers is compact under suitable assumptions.Comment: Final version after referee reports taken into accoun

Rate of convergence to an asymptotic profile for the self-similar fragmentation and growth-fragmentation equations

AbstractWe study the asymptotic behavior of linear evolution equations of the type ∂tg=Dg+Lg−λg, where L is the fragmentation operator, D is a differential operator, and λ is the largest eigenvalue of the operator Dg+Lg. In the case Dg=−∂xg, this equation is a rescaling of the growth-fragmentation equation, a model for cellular growth; in the case Dg=−∂x(xg), it is known that λ=1 and the equation is the self-similar fragmentation equation, closely related to the self-similar behavior of solutions of the fragmentation equation ∂tf=Lf.By means of entropy–entropy dissipation inequalities, we give general conditions for g to converge exponentially fast to the steady state G of the linear evolution equation, suitably normalized. In other words, the linear operator has a spectral gap in the natural L2 space associated to the steady state. We extend this spectral gap to larger spaces using a recent technique based on a decomposition of the operator in a dissipative part and a regularizing part

Rate of convergence to self-similarity for the fragmentation equation in L^1 spaces

In a recent result by the authors (ref. [1]) it was proved that solutions of the self-similar fragmentation equation converge to equilibrium exponentially fast. This was done by showing a spectral gap in weighted $L^2$ spaces of the operator defining the time evolution. In the present work we prove that there is also a spectral gap in weighted $L^1$ spaces, thus extending exponential convergence to a larger set of initial conditions. The main tool is an extension result in ref. [4]

Existence and approximation of probability measure solutions to models of collective behaviors

In this paper we consider first order differential models of collective behaviors of groups of agents based on the mass conservation equation. Models are formulated taking the spatial distribution of the agents as the main unknown, expressed in terms of a probability measure evolving in time. We develop an existence and approximation theory of the solutions to such models and we show that some recently proposed models of crowd and swarm dynamics fit our theoretic paradigm.Comment: 31 pages, 1 figur

Convergence to equilibrium for the discrete coagulation-fragmentation equations with detailed balance

Under the condition of detailed balance and some additional restrictions on the size of the coefficients, we identify the equilibrium distribution to which solutions of the discrete coagulation-fragmentation system of equations converge for large times, thus showing that there is a critical mass which marks a change in the behavior of the solutions. This was previously known only for particular cases as the generalized Becker-D\"oring equations. Our proof is based on an inequality between the entropy and the entropy production which also gives some information on the rate of convergence to equilibrium for solutions under the critical mass.Comment: 28 page

A well-posedness theory in measures for some kinetic models of collective motion

We present existence, uniqueness and continuous dependence results for some kinetic equations motivated by models for the collective behavior of large groups of individuals. Models of this kind have been recently proposed to study the behavior of large groups of animals, such as flocks of birds, swarms, or schools of fish. Our aim is to give a well-posedness theory for general models which possibly include a variety of effects: an interaction through a potential, such as a short-range repulsion and long-range attraction; a velocity-averaging effect where individuals try to adapt their own velocity to that of other individuals in their surroundings; and self-propulsion effects, which take into account effects on one individual that are independent of the others. We develop our theory in a space of measures, using mass transportation distances. As consequences of our theory we show also the convergence of particle systems to their corresponding kinetic equations, and the local-in-time convergence to the hydrodynamic limit for one of the models

One-dimensional inelastic Boltzmann equation: Regularity \& uniqueness of self-similar profiles for moderately hard potentials

We prove uniqueness of self-similar profiles for the one-dimensional inelastic Boltzmann equation with moderately hard potentials, that is with collision kernel of the form | $\bullet$ | $\gamma$ for $\gamma$ > 0 small enough (explicitly quantified). Our result provides the first uniqueness statement for self-similar profiles of inelastic Boltzmann models allowing for strong inelasticity besides the explicitly solvable case of Maxwell interactions (corresponding to $\gamma$ = 0). Our approach relies on a perturbation argument from the corresponding Maxwell model through a careful study of the associated linearised operator. In particular, a part of the paper is devoted to the trend to equilibrium for the Maxwell model in suitable weighted Sobolev spaces, an extension of results which are known to hold in weaker topologies. Our results can be seen as a first step towards a full proof, in the one-dimensional setting, of a conjecture in Ernst \& Brito (2002) regarding the determination of the long-time behaviour of solutions to inelastic Boltzmann equation

Collective behavior of animals: swarming and complex patterns

En esta nota repasamos algunos modelos basados en individuos para describir el movimiento colectivo de agentes, a lo que nos referimos usando la voz inglesa swarming. Estos modelos se basan en EDOs (ecuaciones diferenciales ordinarias) y muestran un comportamiento asintótico complejo y rico en patrones, que mostramos numéricamente. Además, comentamos cómo se conectan estos modelos de partículas con las ecuaciones en derivadas parciales para describir la evolución de densidades de individuos de forma continua. Las cuestiones matemáticas relacionadas con la estabilidad de de estos modelos de EDP's (ecuaciones en derivadas parciales) despiertan gran interés en la investigación en biología matemáticaIn this short note we review some of the individual based models of the collective motion of agents, called swarming. These models based on ODEs (ordinary differential equations) exhibit a complex rich asymptotic behavior in terms of patterns, that we show numerically. Moreover, we comment on how these particle models are connected to partial differential equations to describe the evolution of densities of individuals in a continuum manner. The mathematical questions behind the stability issues of these PDE (partial differential equations) models are questions of actual interest in mathematical biology researc

Radiation heat savings in polysilicon production: validation of results through a CVD laboratory prototype

This work aims at a deeper understanding of the energy loss phenomenon in polysilicon production reactors by the so-called Siemens process. Contributions to the energy consumption of the polysilicon deposition step are studied in this paper, focusing on the radiation heat loss phenomenon. A theoretical model for radiation heat loss calculations is experimentally validated with the help of a laboratory CVD prototype. Following the results of the model, relevant parameters that directly affect the amount of radiation heat losses are put forward. Numerical results of the model applied to a state-of-the-art industrial reactor show the influence of these parameters on energy consumption due to radiation per kilogram of silicon produced; the radiation heat loss can be reduced by 3.8% when the reactor inner wall radius is reduced from 0.78 to 0.70 m, by 25% when the wall emissivity is reduced from 0.5 to 0.3, and by 12% when the final rod diameter is increased from 12 to 15 cm

Dissolution and gettering of iron during contact co-firing

The dissolution and gettering of iron is studied during the final fabrication step of multicrystalline silicon solar cells, the co-firing step, through simulations and experiments. The post-processed interstitial iron concentration is simulated according to the as-grown concentration and distribution of iron within a silicon wafer, both in the presence and absence of the phosphorus emitter, and applying different time-temperature profiles for the firing step. The competing effects of dissolution and gettering during the short annealing process are found to be strongly dependant on the as-grown material quality. Furthermore, increasing the temperature of the firing process leads to a higher dissolution of iron, hardly compensated by the higher diffusivity of impurities. A new defect engineering tool is introduced, the extended co-firing, which could allow an enhanced gettering effect within a small additional tim