Global existence and uniqueness for a singular/degenerate Cahn–Hilliard system with viscosity

Existence and uniqueness are investigated for a nonlinear diffusion problem of phase-field type, consisting of a parabolic system of two partial differential equations, complemented by Neumann homogeneous boundary conditions and initial conditions. This system aims to model two-species phase segregation on an atomic lattice (Podio-Guidugli, 2006 [19], ); in the balance equations of microforces and microenergy, the two unknowns are the order parameter ρ and the chemical potential μ. A simpler version of the same system has recently been discussed in Colli et al. (2011) [8]. In this paper, a fairly more general phase-field equation for ρ is coupled with a genuinely nonlinear diffusion equation for μ. The existence of a global-in-time solution is proved with the help of suitable a priori estimates. In the case of a constant atom mobility, a new and rather unusual uniqueness proof is given, based on a suitable combination of variables.