Existence and uniqueness of a weak solution to fractional single-phase-lag heat equation

Abstract: In this article, we study the existence and uniqueness of a weak solution to the fractional single-phase lag heat equation. This model contains the terms $\cal{D}_t^\alpha(u_t)$ and $\cal{D}_t^\alpha u $ (with $\alpha \in(0,1)$), where $\cal{D}_t^\alpha$ denotes the Caputo fractional derivative in time of constant order $\alpha\in(0,1)$. We consider homogeneous Dirichlet boundary data for the temperature. We rigorously show the existence of a unique weak solution under low regularity assumptions on the data. Our main strategy is to use the variational formulation and a semidiscretisation in time based on Rothe's method. We obtain a priori estimates on the discrete solutions and show convergence of the Rothe functions to a weak solution. The variational approach is employed to show the uniqueness of this weak solution to the problem. We also consider the one-dimensional problem and derive a representation formula for the solution. We establish bounds on this explicit solution and its time derivative by extending properties of the multinomial Mittag-Leffler function.