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arXiv · 2505.10676

Variational structure of Fokker-Planck equations with variable mobility

Hailiang Liu·Athanasios E. Tzavaras
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Abstract

We study Fokker--Planck equations with symmetric, positive definite mobility matrices capturing diffusion in heterogeneous environments. A weighted Wasserstein metric is introduced for which these equations are gradient flows. This metric is shown to emerge from an optimal control problem in the space of probability densities for a class of variable mobility matrices, with the cost function capturing the work dissipated via friction. Using the Nash-Kuiper isometric embedding theorem for Riemannian manifolds, we demonstrate the existence of optimal transport maps. Additionally, we construct a time-discrete variational scheme, establish key properties for the associated minimizing problem, and prove convergence to weak solutions of the associated Fokker-Planck equation.

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Hailiang Liu, Athanasios E. Tzavaras. 2025-05-15. Variational structure of Fokker-Planck equations with variable mobility. https://arxiv.org/abs/2505.10676

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