TWO-PHASE INCOMPRESSIBLE FLOWS WITH VARIABLE DENSITY: AN ENERGETIC VARIATIONAL APPROACH

In this paper, we study a diffuse-interface model for two-phase incompressible flows with different densities. First, we present a derivation of the model using an energetic variational approach. Our model allows large density ratio between the two phases and moreover, it is thermodynamically consistent and admits a dissipative energy law. Under suitable assumptions on the average density function, we establish the global existence of a weak solution in the 3D case as well as the global well-posedness of strong solutions in the 2D case to an initial-boundary problem for the resulting Allen-Cahn-Navier-Stokes system. Furthermore, we investigate the longtime behavior of the 2D strong solutions. In particular, we obtain existence of a maximal compact attractor and prove that the solution will converge to an equilibrium as time goes to infinity.