On growth and instability for semilinear evolution equations: an abstract approach

We propose a new approach to the study of (nonlinear) growth and instability for semilinear evolution equations with compact nonlinearities. We show, in particular, that compact nonlinear perturbations of a linear evolution equation can be treated as linear ones as far as the growth of their solutions is concerned. We obtain exponential lower bounds of solutions for initial values from a dense set if, e.g., the resolvent of the generator is unbounded on a vertical line in the right halfplane.