This paper studi
es the dynamical properti
es of the chemotaxis system
under homogeneous Neumann boundary conditions in bounded convex domains
惟⊂Rn,
n≥1, with positive constants
蠂,
r and
渭.
Numerical simulations but also some rigorous evidence have shown that depending on the relative size of r, 渭 and |惟|, in comparison to the well-understood case when 蠂=0, this problem may exhibit quite a complex solution behavior, including unexpected effects such as asymptotic decay of the quantity u within large subdomains of 惟.
The present work indicates that any such extinction phenomenon, if occurring at all, necessarily must be of spatially local nature, whereas the population as a whole always persists. More precisely, it is shown that for any nonnegative global classical solution (u,v) of (鈰? with u鈮? one can find m鈰?/sub>>0 such that
The proof is based on an, in this context, apparently novel analysis of the functional
∫惟ln鈦, deriving a lower bound for this quantity along a suitable sequence of tim
es by appropriately exploiting a differential inequality for a suitable linear combination of
∫惟ln鈦,
∫惟u and
∫惟v2.