Nonlinear Landau damping for the Vlasov-Poisson system in $\R^3$: the Poisson equilibrium

Abstract

We prove asymptotic stability of the Poisson homogeneous equilibrium among solutions of the Vlassov-Poisson system in the Euclidean space $\mathbb{R}^3$. More precisely, we show that small, smooth, and localized perturbations of the Poisson equilibrium lead to global solutions of the Vlasov-Poisson system, which scatter to linear solutions at a polynomial rate as $t\to\infty$. The Euclidean problem we consider here differs significantly from the classical work on Landau damping in the periodic setting, in several ways. Most importantly, the linearized problem cannot satisfy a "Penrose condition". As a result, our system contains resonances (small divisors) and the electric field is a superposition of an electrostatic component and a larger oscillatory component, both with polynomially decaying rates.