Stability of AVTD Behavior within the Polarized $T^2$-symmetric vacuum spacetimes

Abstract: We prove stability of the family of Kasner solutions within the class of polarized $T^2$-symmetric solutions of the vacuum Einstein equations in the contracting time direction with respect to an areal time foliation. All Kasner solutions for which the asymptotic velocity parameter $K$ satisfies $|K-1|>2$ are non-linearly stable, and all sufficiently small perturbations exhibit asymptotically velocity term dominated (AVTD) behavior and blow-up of the Kretschmann scalar.