On the role of numerical viscosity in the study of the local limit of nonlocal conservation laws

We deal with the numerical investigation of the local limit of nonlocal conservation laws. Previous numerical experiments seem to suggest that the solutions of the nonlocal problems converge to the entropy admissible solution of the conservation law in the singular local limit. However, recent analytical results state that (i) in general convergence does not hold because one can exhibit counterexamples; (ii)~convergence can be recovered provided viscosity is added to both the local and the nonlocal equations. Motivated by these analytical results, we investigate the role of numerical viscosity in the numerical study of the local limit of nonlocal conservation laws. In particular, we show that Lax-Friedrichs type schemes may provide the wrong intuition and erroneously suggest that the solutions of the nonlocal problems converge to the entropy admissible solution of the conservation law in cases where this is ruled out by analytical results. We also test Godunov type schemes, less affected by numerical viscosity, and show that in some cases they provide an intuition more in accordance with the analytical results.

Differential invariant method for seeking nonlocally related systems and nonlocal symmetries. I: General theory and examples

Nonlocally related systems, obtained through conservation law and symmetry-based methods, have proved to be useful for determining nonlocal symmetries, nonlocal conservation laws, non-invertible mappings and new exact solutions of a given partial differential equation (PDE) system. In this paper, it is shown that the symmetry-based method is a differential invariant-based method. It is shown that this allows one to naturally extend the symmetry-based method to ordinary differential equation (ODE) systems and to PDE systems with at least three independent variables. In particular, we present the situations for ODE systems, PDE systems with two independent variables and PDE systems with three or more independent variables, separately, and show that these three situations are directly connected. Examples are exhibited for each of the three situations.

Existence and uniqueness results for a class of nonlocal conservation laws by means of a Lax–Hopf-type solution formula

We study the initial value problem and the initial boundary value problem for nonlocal conservation laws. The nonlocal term is realized via a spatial integration of the solution between specified boundaries and affects the flux function of a given “local” conservation law in a multiplicative way. For a strictly convex flux function and strictly positive nonlocal impact we prove existence and uniqueness of weak entropy solutions relying on a fixed-point argument for the nonlocal term and an explicit Lax–Hopf-type solution formula for the corresponding Hamilton–Jacobi (HJ) equation. Using the developed theory for HJ equations, we obtain a semi-explicit Lax–Hopf-type formula for the solution of the corresponding nonlocal HJ equation and a semi-explicit Lax–Oleinik-type formula for the nonlocal conservation law.

Nonlocal Conservation Laws of PDEs Possessing Differential Coverings

In his 1892 paper, L. Bianchi noticed, among other things, that quite simple transformations of the formulas that describe the Bäcklund transformation of the sine-Gordon equation lead to what is called a nonlocal conservation law in modern language. Using the techniques of differential coverings, we show that this observation is of a quite general nature. We describe the procedures to construct such conservation laws and present a number of illustrative examples.