GLOBAL WELL-POSEDNESS OF THE VISCOUS BOUSSINESQ EQUATIONS

We prove the global well-posedness of the viscous incompressible Boussinesq equations in two spatial dimensions for general initial data in $H^m$ with $m\ge 3$. It is known that when both the velocity and the density equations have finite positive viscosity, the Boussinesq system does not develop finite time singularities. We consider here the challenging case when viscosity enters only in the velocity equation, but there is no viscosity in the density equation. Using sharp and delicate energy estimates, we prove global existence and strong regularity of this viscous Boussinesq system for general initial data in $H^m$ with $m \ge 3$.