Asymptotic expansions for semilinear waves on asymptotically flat spacetimes
Abstract
We establish precise asymptotic expansions for solutions to semilinear wave equations with power-type nonlinearities on asymptotically flat spacetimes. Our analysis focuses on two key cases: cubic nonlinearities and higher-order power nonlinearities. For cubic nonlinearities of the form , we prove asymptotic expansions for the solution globally in the spacetime. In the special case of compact spatial regions, solutions exhibit the asymptotic behavior . For higher-order nonlinearities with , we prove the solution satisfies , thereby extending the classical Price's law (a late-time tail postulated in 1972) to nonlinear settings in a precise fashion. These results sharpen previous decay estimates for nonlinear waves. We develop a radiation field expansion and a low-energy resolvent expansion adapted to conormal asymptotic inputs, extending Hintz's approach for linear waves to the semilinear setting. Our methods connect geometric microlocal analysis (b-calculus) with classical physical-space techniques, providing a convenient tool for analyzing asymptotic behavior of nonlinear waves.
Keywords
Cite
@article{arxiv.2407.08997,
title = {Asymptotic expansions for semilinear waves on asymptotically flat spacetimes},
author = {Shi-Zhuo Looi and Haoren Xiong},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2407.08997},
year = {2025}
}
Comments
38 pages