Pinning of Interfaces by Localized Dry Friction

We consider a model for the evolution of an interface in a heterogeneous environment governed by a parabolic equation. The heterogeneity is introduced as obstacles exerting a localized dry friction. Our main result establishes the emergence of a rate-independent hysteresis for suitable randomly distributed obstacles, i.e., interfaces are pinned by the obstacles until a certain critical applied driving force is exceeded. The treatment of such a model in the context of pinning and depinning requires a comparison principle. We prove this property and hence the existence of viscosity solutions. Moreover, under reasonable assumptions, we show that viscosity solutions are equivalent to weak solutions.