Direct and inverse problems for thermal grooving by surface diffusion with time dependent Mullins coefficient

Abstract

We consider the Mullins’ equation of a single surface grooving when the surface diffusion is not considered as very slow. This problem can be formed by a surface grooving of profiles in a finite space region. The finiteness of the space region allows to apply the Fourier series analysis for one groove and also to consider the Mullins coefficient as well as slope of the groove root to be time-dependent. We also solve the inverse problem of finding time-dependent Mullins coefficient from total mass measurement. For both of these problems, the grooving side boundary conditions are identical to those of Mullins, and the opposite boundary is accompanied by a zero position and zero curvature which both together arrive at self adjoint boundary conditions.

Keywords

• mullins’ equation
• initial-boundary value problem
• inverse coefficient problem
• fourier method