We are concerned with a Cauchy problem for the semilinear heat equation

then u is called a backward self-similar solution blowing up at t = T. Let pS and pL be the Sobolev and the Lepin exponents, respectively. It was shown by Mizoguchi (J. Funct. Analysis257 (2009), 2911–2937) that k ≡ (p − 1)−1/(p−1) is a unique regular radial solution of (P) if p > pL. We prove that it remains valid for p = pL. We also show the uniqueness of singular radial solution of (P) for p > pS. These imply that the structure of radial backward self-similar blow-up solutions is quite simple for p ≥ pL.

The existence of infinitely many solutions for an autonomous elliptic Dirichlet problem involving the p-Laplacian is investigated. The approach is based on variational methods.

We consider the spatially inhomogeneous and anisotropic reaction–diffusion equation ut = m(x)−1 div[m(x)ap(x,∇u)] + ε−2f(u), involving a small parameter ε > 0 and a bistable nonlinear term whose stable equilibria are 0 and 1. We use a Finsler metric related to the anisotropic diffusion term and work in relative geometry. We prove a weak comparison principle and perform an analysis of both the generation and the motion of interfaces. More precisely, we show that, within the time-scale of order ε2|ln ε|, the unique weak solution uε develops a steep transition layer that separates the regions {uε ≈ 0} and {uε | 1}. Then, on a much slower time-scale, the layer starts to propagate. Consequently, as ε → 0, the solution uε converges almost everywhere (a.e.) to 0 in Ω−t and 1 in Ω+t , where Ω−t and Ω+t are sub-domains of Ω separated by an interface Гt, whose motion is driven by its anisotropic mean curvature. We also prove that the thickness of the transition layer is of order ε.

The Hermite-Hadamard inequality not only is a consequence of convexity but also characterizes it: if a continuous function satisfies either its left-hand side or its right-hand side on each compact subinterval of the domain, then it is necessarily convex. The aim of this paper is to prove analogous statements for the higher-order extensions of the Hermite-Hadamard inequality. The main tools of the proofs are smoothing by convolution and the support properties of higher-order monotone functions.

This paper deals with the large-time behaviour of solutions to the exterior problem of the non-Newtonian filtration equation with first-order term and nonlinear boundary source. In particular, the critical global exponent and the critical Fujita exponent are determined or estimated. An interesting phenomenon is shown: there exists a threshold value for the coefficient of the first-order term such that the critical global exponent is strictly less than the critical Fujita exponent when the coefficient is under this threshold, while these two exponents are identically equal when the coefficient is over this value.

We consider atomic chains with nearest neighbour interactions and study periodic travelling waves and homoclinic travelling waves, which are called wavetrains and solitons, respectively. Our main result is a new existence proof which relies on the constrained maximization of the potential energy and exploits the invariance properties of an improvement operator. The approach is restricted to convex interaction potentials but refines the standard results, as it provides the existence of travelling waves with unimodal and even profile functions. Moreover, we discuss both the numerical approximation and the complete localization of wavetrains, and show that wavetrains converge to solitons when the periodicity length tends to infinity.

We look for standing waves for nonlinear Schrödinger equations

with cylindrically symmetric potentials g vanishing at infinity and non-increasing, and a C1 nonlinear term satisfying weak assumptions. In particular, we show the existence of standing waves with non-vanishing angular momentum with prescribed L2 norm. The solutions are obtained via a minimization argument, and the proof is given for an abstract functional which presents a lack of compactness. As a specific case, we prove the existence of standing waves with non-vanishing angular momentum for the nonlinear hydrogen atom equation.

This paper is devoted to the study of the asymptotic behaviour of the high-frequency spectrum of the wave equation with periodic coefficients in a ‘thin’ elastic strip Ση=(0, 1)×(−η/2, η/2), η > 0. The main geometric assumption is that the structure period is of the order of magnitude of the strip thickness η and is chosen in such a way that η−1 is a positive large integer. On the boundary ∂Ση, we set Dirichlet (clamped) or Neumann (traction-free) boundary conditions. Aiming to describe sequences of eigenvalues of order η−2 in the above problem, which correspond to oscillations of high frequencies of order η−1, we study an appropriately rescaled limit of the spectrum. Using a suitable notion of two-scale convergence for bounded operators acting on two-scale spaces, we show that the limiting spectrum consists of two parts: the Bloch (or band) spectrum and the ‘boundary’ spectrum. The latter corresponds to sequences of eigenvectors concentrating on the vertical boundaries of Ση, and is characterised by a problem set in a semi-infinite periodic strip with either clamped or stress-free boundary conditions. Based on the observation that some of the related eigenvalues can be found by solving an appropriate periodic-cell problem, we use modal methods to investigate finite-thickness semi-infinite waveguides. We compare our results with those for finite-thickness infinite waveguides given in Adams et al. (Proc. R. Soc. Lond. A, vol. 464, 2008, pp. 2669–2692). We also study infinite-thickness semi-infinite waveguides in order to gain insight into the finite-height analogue. We develop an asymptotic algorithm making use of the unimodular property of the modal method to demonstrate that in the weak contrast limit, and when wavenumber across the guide is fixed, there is at most one surface wave per gap in the spectrum. Using the monomode property of the waveguide we can consider the gap structure for the nth mode, when doing so, for traction-free boundaries, we find exactly one surface wave in each n-band gap.

We study the coupled surface and grain boundary motion in bi- and tricrystals in three-space dimensions, building on previous work by the authors on the simplified two-dimensional case. The motion of the interfaces, which in this paper are presented by two-dimensional hypersurfaces, is described by two types of normal velocities: motion by mean curvature and motion by surface diffusion. Three hypersurfaces meet at triple-junction lines, where junction conditions need to hold. Similarly, boundary conditions are prescribed where an interface meets an external boundary, and these conditions naturally give rise to contact angles. We present a variational formulation of the flows, which leads to a fully practical finite-element approximation that exhibits excellent mesh properties, with no mesh smoothing or remeshing required in practice. For the introduced parametric finite-element approximation we show well posedness and, in general, unconditional stability, i.e. there is no restriction on the chosen time-step size. Moreover, the induced discrete equations are linear and easy to solve. A generalisation to anisotropic surface energies is straightforward. Several numerical results in two- and three-space dimensions are presented, including simulations for thermal grooving and sintering. Three-dimensional simulations featuring quadruple junction points, non-standard boundary contact angles and fully anisotropic surface energies are also presented.

The line graph G of a directed graph G has a vertex for every edge of G and an edge for every path of length 2 in G. In 1967, Knuth used the Matrix Tree Theorem to prove a formula for the number of spanning trees of G, and he asked for a bijective proof [6]. In this paper, we give a bijective proof of Knuth's formula. As a result of this proof, we find a bijection between binary de Bruijn sequences of degree n and binary sequences of length 2n−1. Finally, we determine the critical groups of all the Kautz graphs and de Bruijn graphs, generalizing a result of Levine [7].

Given a separable Banach space E, we construct an extremely non-complex Banach space (i.e. a space satisfying that ‖ Id + T2 ‖ = 1 + ‖ T2 ‖ for every bounded linear operator T on it) whose dual contains E* as an L-summand. We also study surjective isometries on extremely non-complex Banach spaces and construct an example of a real Banach space whose group of surjective isometries reduces to ±Id, but the group of surjective isometries of its dual contains the group of isometries of a separable infinite-dimensional Hilbert space as a subgroup.

We say that α ∈ [0, 1) is a jump for an integer r ≥ 2 if there exists c(α) > 0 such that for all ϵ > 0 and all t ≥ 1, any r-graph with n ≥ n0(α, ϵ, t) vertices and density at least α + ϵ contains a subgraph on t vertices of density at least α + c.

The Erdős–Stone–Simonovits theorem [4, 5] implies that for r = 2, every α ∈ [0, 1) is a jump. Erdős [3] showed that for all r ≥ 3, every α ∈ [0, r!/rr) is a jump. Moreover he made his famous ‘jumping constant conjecture’, that for all r ≥ 3, every α ∈ [0, 1) is a jump. Frankl and Rödl [7] disproved this conjecture by giving a sequence of values of non-jumps for all r ≥ 3.

We use Razborov's flag algebra method [9] to show that jumps exist for r = 3 in the interval [2/9, 1). These are the first examples of jumps for any r ≥ 3 in the interval [r!/rr, 1). To be precise, we show that for r = 3 every α ∈ [0.2299, 0.2316) is a jump.

We also give an improved upper bound for the Turán density of K4− = {123, 124, 134}: π(K4−) ≤ 0.2871. This in turn implies that for r = 3 every α ∈ [0.2871, 8/27) is a jump.

In this paper we consider the influences of variables on Boolean functions in general product spaces. Unlike the case of functions on the discrete cube, where there is a clear definition of influence, in the general case several definitions have been presented in different papers. We propose a family of definitions for the influence that contains all the known definitions, as well as other natural definitions, as special cases. We show that the proofs of the BKKKL theorem and of other results can be adapted to our new definition. The adaptation leads to generalizations of these theorems, which are tight in terms of the definition of influence used in the assertion.

In this paper1 we introduce a family of models to describe the spatio-temporal dynamics of criminal activity. It is argued here that with a minimal set of mechanisms corresponding to elements that are basic in the study of crime, one can observe the formation of hot spots. By analysing the simplest versions of our model, we exhibit a self-organised critical state of illegal activities that we propose to call a warm spot or a tepid milieu2 depending on the context. It is characterised by a positive level of illegal or uncivil activity that maintains itself without exploding, in contrast with genuine hot spots where localised high level or peaks are being formed. Within our framework, we further investigate optimal policy issues under the constraint of limited resources in law enforcement and deterrence. We also introduce extensions of our model that take into account repeated victimisation effects, local and long range interactions, and briefly discuss some of the resulting effects such as hysteresis phenomena.

The coupled motion between shallow-water sloshing in a moving vehicle and the vehicle dynamics is considered, with the vehicle dynamics restricted to horizontal motion. The paper is motivated by Cooker's experiments and theory for water waves in a suspended container. A new derivation of the coupled problem in the Eulerian fluid representation is given. However, it is found that transformation to a Lagrangian representation leads to a formulation which has nice properties for numerical simulation. In the Lagrangian representation, a simple and fast numerical algorithm with excellent energy conservation over long times, based on the Störmer–Verlet method, is implemented. Numerical simulations of the coupled dynamics in both the linear and non-linear case are presented.