The reactive-telegraph equation and a related kinetic model

Abstract

We study the long-range, long-time behavior of the reactive-telegraph equation and a related reactive-kinetic model. The two problems are equivalent in one spatial dimension. We point out that the reactive-telegraph equation, meant to model a population density, does not preserve positivity in higher dimensions. In view of this, in dimensions larger than one, we consider a reactive-kinetic model and investigate the long-range, long-time limit of the solutions. We provide a general characterization of the speed of propagation and we compute it explicitly in one and two dimensions. We show that a phase transition between parabolic and hyperbolic behavior takes place only in one dimension. Finally, we investigate the hydrodynamic limit of the limiting problem.