Abstract
We consider a problem of modeling the thermal diffusion process in a closed metal wire wrapped around a thin sheet of insulation material. The layer of insulation is assumed to be slightly permeable. Therefore, the temperature value from one side affects the diffusion process on the other side. For this reason, the standard heat equation is modified, and a third term with an involution is added. Modeling of this process leads to the consideration of an inverse problem for a one‐dimensional fractional evolution equation with involution and with periodic boundary conditions with respect to a space variable. This equation interpolates heat equation. Such equations are also called nonlocal subdiffusion equations or nonlocal heat equations. The inverse problem consists in the restoration (simultaneously with the solution) of the unknown right‐hand side of the equation, which depends only on the spatial variable. The conditions for overdefinition are initial and final states. Existence and uniqueness results for the given problem are obtained via the method of separation of variables.