Poisson growth
N. Robb McDonald, Mark B. Mineev-Weinstein · Analysis and Mathematical Physics · 2014
The two-dimensional free boundary problem in which the field is governed by Poisson’s equation and for which the velocity of the free boundary is given by the gradient of the field—Poisson growth—is considered. The problem is a generalisation of classic Hele-Shaw free boundary flow or Laplacian growth problem and has many applications. In the case when the right hand side of Poisson’s equation is constant, a formulation is obtained in terms of the Schwarz function of the free boundary. From this it is deduced that solutions of the Laplacian growth problem also satisfy the Poisson growth problem, the only difference being in their time evolution. The corresponding moment evolution equations, a Polubarinova–Galin type equation and a Baiocchi-type transformation for Poisson growth are also presented. Some explicit examples are given, one in which cusp formation is inhibited by the addition of the Poisson term, and another for a growing finger in which the Poisson term selects the width of the finger to be half that of the channel. For the more complicated case when the right hand side is linear in one space direction, the Schwarz function method is used to derive an exact solution describing a translating circular blob with changing radius.