On the steady motion of Navier-Stokes flows past a fixed obstacle in a three-dimensional channel under mixed boundary conditions

Abstract

We analyze the steady motion of a viscous incompressible fluid in a three-dimensional channel containing an obstacle through the Navier-Stokes equations with mixed boundary conditions: the inflow is given by a fairly general datum and the flow is assumed to satisfy a constant traction boundary condition on the outlet, together with the standard no-slip assumption on the obstacle and on the remaining walls of the domain. Explicit bounds on the inflow velocity guaranteeing existence and uniqueness of such steady motion are provided after estimating some Sobolev embedding constants and constructing a suitable solenoidal extension of the inlet velocity through the Bogovskii formula. A quantitative analysis of the forces exterted by the fluid over the obstacle constitutes the main application of our results: by deriving a volume integral formula for the drag and lift, explicit upper bounds on these forces are given in terms of the geometrical constraints of the domain.