This paper studies the stability and instability properties of solitary wave solutions φ(x – ct) of a general class of evolution equations of the form Muttf(u)x=0, which support weakly nonlinear dispersive waves. It turns out that, depending on their speed c and the relation between the dispersion (i.e. the order of the pseudodifferential operator) and the nonlinearity, travelling waves maybe stable or unstable. Sharp conditions to that effect are given.

We consider linear and nonlinear elliptic equations in divergence form on Riemannian manifolds with or without boundary. In the former case we impose a homogeneous Neumann boundary condition. By making use of isoperimetric inequalities for manifolds, we obtain a priori sharp estimates for the decreasing rearrangement of the solutions to such equations. These estimates enable us to derive bounds for suitable norms of the solutions and of their gradients.

Consider the reaction-diffusion equation in ℝN × ℝ+: ut − h2 Δu + Φ(u) = 0, where Φ is the derivative of a bistable even potential, and h is a small parameter. If the initial data have a smooth noncritical zero set, we prove that an interface appears in time O(log (h−1)), and that the solution stays close to it for at least time O(1/√h).

It is shown that a cantilevered beam with weak viscoelastic damping of Boltzmann-type can be uniformly stabilised by velocity feedback applied as a shearing force at the free end of the beam. Estimates for the viscoelastic energy are derived using the energy multiplier method. The energy decay is related to the decay of the relaxation modulus associated with the viscoelastic material.

Leading order approximations are given by a patching method for passage through resonance in the case when the resonance zone contains saddle points. The approximations are uniformly valid regardless of the length of time required to pass through the resonance. Accuracy for extended time periods is obtained by asking not for approximate solutions with specified initial values, but for approximate solutions which are “shadowed” by exact solutions in the resonance zone.

We consider the above equation on the interval 0 ≦ x ≦ 1 subject to Neumann boundary conditions with f(u) = F′(u) where F is a double well energy density function with equal minima. Our previous work [3] proved the existence and persistence of very slowly evolving patterns (metastable states) in solutions with two-phase initial data. Here we characterise these metastable states in terms of the global unstable manifolds of equilibria, as conjectured by Fusco and Hale [6].

Using the theory of generalised characteristics, we study the structure of BV solutions of genuinely nonlinear systems of two conservation laws whose shock and rarefaction wave curves of the first family are straight lines. We also establish a priori estimates on the variation of the solution similar to those obtained earlier by Glimm and Lax.

For a domain Ω in the Euclidean space Rd (d = 2, 3) existence of weak solutions for both interior and exterior Dirichlet boundary value problems of the Ginzburg-Landau equations are established without any restriction on the range of the coupling constant λ, thesize of Ω, or the boundary data. For the critical choice λ = 1, we prove the existence of confined multivortices in a bounded domain by a constructive monotone iteration method.

We consider the initial boundary value problem for the equations of one-dimensional nonlinear thermoelasticity in ℝ+; and prove a global existence-uniqueness theorem for small smooth data. The asymptotic behaviour is simultaneously obtained.

We consider the scattering of time harmonic electromagnetic waves by an inhomogeneous medium of compact support, i.e. the permittivity ε = ε(x) and the conductivity σ = σ(x) are functions of x ∊ ℝ3. Existence, uniqueness and regularity results are established for the direct scattering problem. Then, based on existence and uniqueness results for the exterior and interior impedance boundary value problem, a method is presented for solving the inverse scattering problem.

We prove Cm, μ almost everywhere regularity for minimisers of functional of the form ∫f(x, su, Dmu)dx, where f is uniformly strictly quasiconvex.

The paper suggests a procedure for direct construction of minimal extensions of constrained optimisation problems, particularly those containing controls in coefficients of elliptic equations. The preliminary version of the procedure has been described in [1].

The electrical heating of a conductor connected with a current limiting device of total resistance R is studied under mixed boundary conditions. A theorem of existence is given using a transformation which permits the reduction of the nonlinear system governing the problem to the classical mixed boundary value problem for the Laplace equation.

We obtain an inequality for Lp spaces (1<p >2) which corrects an inequality claimed by Xu and Xu [6] and has connections with some quantities of interest in fixed point theory.