Forwards attractors for non-autonomous Lotka-Volterra cooperative systems: a detailed geometrical description

Abstract: Non-autonomous differential equations exhibit a highly intricate dynamics, and various concepts have been introduced to describe their qualitative behavior. In general, it is rare to obtain time dependent invariant compact attracting sets when time goes to plus infinity. Moreover, there are only a few papers in the literature that explore the geometric structure of such sets. In this paper we investigate the long time behaviour of cooperative $n$-dimensional non-autonomous Lotka-Volterra systems is population dynamics. We provide sufficient conditions for the existence of a globally stable (forward in time) entire solution in which one species becomes extinct, or where all species except one become extinct. Furthermore, we obtain the precise geometrical structure of the non-autonomous forward attractor in one, two, and three dimensions by establishing heteroclinic connections between the globally stable solution and the semi-stable solutions in cases of species permanence and extinction. We believe that understanding time-dependent forward attractors paves the way for a comprehensive analysis of both transient and long-term behavior in non-autonomous phenomena.