Sloshing in containers with vertical walls: isoperimetric inequalities for the fundamental eigenvalue

Abstract

One isoperimetric inequality for the fundamental sloshing eigenvalue is derived under the assumption that containers have vertical side walls and either finite or infinite depth. It asserts that among all such containers, whose free surfaces are convex, have two axes of symmetry and a given perimeter length, this eigenvalue is maximized by infinitely deep ones provided the free surface is either the square or the equilateral triangle. The proof is based on the recent isoperimetric result obtained by A. Henrot, A. Lemenant and I.~Lucardesi for the first nonzero eigenvalue of the two-dimensional Neumann Laplacian under the perimeter constraint. Another isoperimetric inequality for the fundamental eigenvalue, which describes sloshing in containers with vertical walls, is a consequence of the classical result due to G. Szeg\H o concerning the first nonzero eigenvalue of the free membrane problem.