Local existence of solutions to 3D Prandtl equations with a special structure

Abstract

In this paper, we consider the 3D Prandtl equation in a periodic domain and prove the local existence and uniqueness of solutions by the energy method in a polynomial weighted Sobolev space. Compared to the existence and uniqueness of solutions to the classical Prandtl equations where the Crocco transform has always been used with the general outer flow $U\ne \text{constant}$, this Crocco transform is not needed here for 3D Prandtl equations. We use the skill of cancellation mechanism and construct a new unknown function to show that the existence and uniqueness of solutions to 3D Prandtl equations (cf. Masmoudi and Wong (2015) [1]) which extends from the two dimensional case in [1] to the present three dimensional case with a special structure.