Similarity solutions of the Diusion Equation

The diusion equation in one-dimension is ut = uxx (1)

where is the diusion coecient which has dimension L2 T 1 . If we are looking for solutions of (1) on an innite domain x where there is no natural length scale, then we can use the dimensionless variable x = (2) t and look for solutions of (1) in the form u(x, t) = tp g ( ) (3)

where the number p and the function g ( ) are to be determined. Substituting (3) into (1) we nd that tp1 pg g g = 0 (4) 2 and so (5) g + g = pg. 2 This is dicult to solve for arbitrary values of p but for special values we can do something. 1. Take p = 0 and (5) is easily solved to give g ( ) = A e where A is a constant. Integrating again we have

2 /4

(6)

g ( ) = A

2 /4

d .

(7)

This gives a full solution for u(x, t) u(x, t) = A

x t

2 /4

d = 2A erf
1

x 2 t
y 2 e

(8) dy . This has the

where the error function erf ( ) is dened as erf ( ) = property that erf () = 1. 2. Now dene G = g e
2 /4

and we observe that 5) can be transformed into G G = (p + 1/2)G. 2 (9)

This has the trivial solution G = b = const provided p = 1/2. Hence g ( ) = b e This gives a full solution for u(x, t) in the form u(x, t) = b t1/2 e 4t .
x2 2 /4

(10)

(11)