Turing pattern formation with fractional diffusion and fractional reactions

Abstract

We have investigated Turing pattern formation through linear stability analysis and numerical simulations in a two-species reaction–diffusion system in which a fractional order temporal derivative operates on both species, and on both the diffusion term and the reaction term. The order of the fractional derivative affects the time onset of patterning in this model system but it does not affect critical parameters for the onset of Turing instabilities and it does not affect the final spatial pattern. These results contrast with earlier studies of Turing pattern formation in fractional reaction–diffusion systems with a fractional order temporal derivative on the diffusion term but not the reaction term. In addition to elucidating differences between these two model systems, our studies provide further evidence that Turing linear instability analysis is an excellent predictor of both the onset of and the nature of pattern formation in fractional nonlinear reaction–diffusion equations.