Abstract.We study existence and approximation of non-negative solutions of partial differential equations of the typewhere A is a symmetric matrix-valued function of the spatial variable satisfying a uniform ellipticity condition,, we show that u is the "gradient flow" of φ with respect to the 2-Wasserstein distance between probability measures on the space R n , endowed with the Riemannian distance induced by A −1 . In the case of uniform convexity of V , long time asymptotic behaviour and decay rate to the stationary state for solutions of equation (0.1) are studied. A contraction property in Wasserstein distance for solutions of equation (0.1) is also studied in a particular case.Mathematics Subject Classification. 35K55, 35K15, 35B40.