Diameters of the level sets for reaction-diffusion equations in nonperiodic slowly varying media *

Abstract

We consider in this article reaction-diffusion equations of the Fisher-KPP type with a nonlinearity depending on the space variable x, oscillating slowly and non-periodically. We are interested in the width of the interface between the unstable steady state 0 and the stable steady state 1 of the solutions of the Cauchy problem. We prove that, if the heterogeneity has large enough oscillations, then the width of this interface, that is, the diameter of some level sets, diverges linearly as t → +∞ along some sequences of times, while it is sublinear along other sequences. As a corollary, we show that under these conditions generalized transition fronts do not exist for this equation.