Boundary regularity for elliptic systems under a natural growth condition

We consider weak solutions ${u \in u_0 + W^{1,2}_0(\Omega,\mathbb{R}^N) \cap L^{\infty}(\Omega,\mathbb{R}^N)}$ of second-order nonlinear elliptic systems of the type $$- {\rm div} \,a (\, \cdot \,, u, Du ) = b(\, \cdot \,,u,Du)\qquad \text{ in }\Omega$$ with an inhomogeneity satisfying a natural growth condition. In dimensions ${n \in \{2,3,4\}}$ , we show that ${\mathcal{H}^{n-1}}$ -almost every boundary point is a regular point for Du, provided that the boundary data and the coefficients are sufficiently smooth.     

Uniqueness of integrable solutions to {\nabla \zeta=G \zeta, \zeta|_\Gamma = 0} for integrable tensor coefficients G and applications to elasticity

Let ${\Omega \subset \mathbb{R}^{N}}$ be a Lipschitz domain and Γ be a relatively open and non-empty subset of its boundary ${\partial\Omega}$ . We show that the solution to the linear first-order system $$\nabla \zeta = G\zeta, \, \, \zeta|_\Gamma = 0 \quad \quad \quad (1)$$ is unique if ${G \in \textsf{L}^{1}(\Omega; \mathbb{R}^{(N \times N) \times N})}$ and ${\zeta \in \textsf{W}^{1,1}(\Omega; \mathbb{R}^{N})}$ . As a consequence, we prove $$||| \cdot ||| : \textsf{C}_{o}^{\infty}(\Omega, \Gamma; \mathbb{R}^{3}) \rightarrow [0, \infty), \, \, u \mapsto \parallel {\rm sym}(\nabla uP^{-1})\parallel_{\textsf{L}^{2}(\Omega)}$$ to be a norm for ${P \in \textsf{L}^{\infty}(\Omega; \mathbb{R}^{3 \times 3})}$ with Curl ${P \in \textsf{L}^{p}(\Omega; \mathbb{R}^{3 \times 3})}$ , Curl ${P^{-1} \in \textsf{L}^{q}(\Omega; \mathbb{R}^{3 \times 3})}$ for some p, q > 1 with 1/p + 1/q = 1 as well as det ${P \geq c^+ > 0}$ . We also give a new and different proof for the so-called ‘infinitesimal rigid displacement lemma’ in curvilinear coordinates: Let ${\Phi \in \textsf{H}^{1}(\Omega; \mathbb{R}^{3})}$ satisfy sym ${(\nabla\Phi^\top\nabla\Psi) = 0}$ for some ${\Psi \in \textsf{W}^{1,\infty}(\Omega; \mathbb{R}^{3}) \cap \textsf{H}^{2}(\Omega; \mathbb{R}^{3})}$ with det ${\nabla\Psi \geq c^+ > 0}$ . Then, there exist a constant translation vector ${a \in \mathbb{R}^{3}}$ and a constant skew-symmetric matrix ${A \in \mathfrak{so}(3)}$ , such that ${\Phi = A\Psi + a}$ .     

Young measures generated by sequences in Morrey spaces

Let ${\Omega\subset\mathbb{R}^n}$ be open and bounded. For 1 ≤ p < ∞ and 0 ≤ λ < n, we give a characterization of Young measures generated by sequences of functions ${\{{\bf f}_j\}_{j=1}^\infty}$ uniformly bounded in the Morrey space ${L^{p,\lambda}(\Omega;\mathbb{R}^N)}$ with ${\{\left|{{\bf f}_j}\right|^p\}_{j=1}^\infty}$ equiintegrable. We then treat the case that each f _j = ? u _j for some ${{\bf u}_j\in W^{1,p}(\Omega;\mathbb{R}^N)}$ . As an application of our results, we consider the functional $${\bf u} \mapsto \int\limits_{\Omega}f({\bf x}, {\bf u}({\bf x}), {\bf {\nabla}}{\bf u}({\bf x})){\rm d}{\bf x},$$ and provide conditions that guarantee the existence of a minimizing sequence with gradients uniformly bounded in ${L^{p,\lambda}(\Omega;\mathbb{R}^{N\times n})}$ .     

Gamma-convergence of nonlocal perimeter functionals

Given ${\Omega\subset\mathbb{R}^{n}}$ open, connected and with Lipschitz boundary, and ${s\in (0, 1)}$ , we consider the functional $$\mathcal{J}_s(E,\Omega)\,=\, \int_{E\cap \Omega}\int_{E^c\cap\Omega}\frac{dxdy}{|x-y|^{n+s}}+\int_{E\cap \Omega}\int_{E^c\cap \Omega^c}\frac{dxdy}{|x-y|^{n+s}}\,+ \int_{E\cap \Omega^c}\int_{E^c\cap \Omega}\frac{dxdy}{|x-y|^{n+s}},$$ where ${E\subset\mathbb{R}^{n}}$ is an arbitrary measurable set. We prove that the functionals ${(1-s)\mathcal{J}_s(\cdot, \Omega)}$ are equi-coercive in ${L^1_{\rm loc}(\Omega)}$ as ${s\uparrow 1}$ and that $$\Gamma-\lim_{s\uparrow 1}(1-s)\mathcal{J}_s(E,\Omega)=\omega_{n-1}P(E,\Omega),\quad \text{for every }E\subset\mathbb{R}^{n}\,{\rm measurable}$$ where P(E, ??) denotes the perimeter of E in ?? in the sense of De Giorgi. We also prove that as ${s\uparrow 1}$ limit points of local minimizers of ${(1-s)\mathcal{J}_s(\cdot,\Omega)}$ are local minimizers of P(·, ??).     

Uniqueness properties of degenerate elliptic operators

Let ?? be an open subset of R ^d and ${ K=-\sum^d_{i,j=1}\partial_i\,c_{ij}\,\partial_j+\sum^d_{i=1}c_i\partial_i+c_0}$ a second-order partial differential operator with real-valued coefficients ${c_{ij}=c_{ji}\in W^{1,\infty}_{\rm loc}(\Omega),c_i,c_0\in L_{\infty,{\rm loc}}(\Omega)}$ satisfying the strict ellipticity condition ${C=(c_{ij}) >0 }$ . Further let ${H=-\sum^d_{i,j=1} \partial_i\,c_{ij}\,\partial_j}$ denote the principal part of K. Assuming an accretivity condition ${C\geq \kappa (c\otimes c^{\,T})}$ with ${\kappa >0 }$ , an invariance condition ${(1\!\!1_\Omega, K\varphi)=0}$ and a growth condition which allows ${\|C(x)\|\sim |x|^2\log |x|}$ as |x| ?? ?? we prove that K is L ₁-unique if and only if H is L ₁-unique or Markov unique.     

Maximal, potential and singular operators in vanishing generalized Morrey spaces

We introduce vanishing generalized Morrey spaces ${V\mathcal{L}^{p,\varphi}_\Pi (\Omega), \Omega \subseteq \mathbb{R}^n}$ with a general function ${\varphi(x, r)}$ defining the Morrey-type norm. Here ${\Pi \subseteq \Omega}$ is an arbitrary subset in Ω including the extremal cases ${\Pi = \{x_0\}, x_0 \in \Omega}$ and Π = Ω, which allows to unify vanishing local and global Morrey spaces. In the spaces ${V\mathcal{L}^{p,\varphi}_\Pi (\mathbb{R}^n)}$ we prove the boundedness of a class of sublinear singular operators, which includes Hardy-Littlewood maximal operator and Calderon-Zygmund singular operators with standard kernel. We also prove a Sobolev-Spanne type ${V\mathcal{L}^{p,\varphi}_\Pi (\mathbb{R}^n) \rightarrow V\mathcal{L}^{q,\varphi^\frac{q}{p}}_\Pi (\mathbb{R}^n)}$ -theorem for the potential operator I ^α . The conditions for the boundedness are given in terms of Zygmund-type integral inequalities on ${\varphi(x, r)}$ . No monotonicity type condition is imposed on ${\varphi(x, r)}$ . In case ${\varphi}$ has quasi- monotone properties, as a consequence of the main results, the conditions of the boundedness are also given in terms of the Matuszeska-Orlicz indices of the function ${\varphi}$ . The proofs are based on pointwise estimates of the modulars defining the vanishing spaces     

Global solutions in higher dimensions to a fourth-order parabolic equation modeling epitaxial thin-film growth

The initial-value problem for $$u_t=-\Delta^2 u - \mu\Delta u - \lambda \Delta |\nabla u|^2 + f(x)\qquad \qquad (\star)$$ is studied under the conditions ${{\frac{\partial}{\partial\nu}} u={\frac{\partial}{\partial\nu}} \Delta u=0}$ on the boundary of a bounded convex domain ${\Omega \subset {\mathbb{R}}^n}$ with smooth boundary. This problem arises in the modeling of the evolution of a thin surface when exposed to molecular beam epitaxy. Correspondingly the physically most relevant spatial setting is obtained when n?=?2, but previous mathematical results appear to concentrate on the case n?=?1. In this work, it is proved that when n??? 3,??? ?? 0, ???>?0 and ${f \in L^\infty(\Omega)}$ satisfies ${{\int_\Omega} f \ge 0}$ , for each prescribed initial distribution ${u_0 \in L^\infty(\Omega)}$ fulfilling ${{\int_\Omega} u_0 \ge 0}$ , there exists at least one global weak solution ${u \in L^2_{loc}([0,\infty); W^{1,2}(\Omega))}$ satisfying ${{\int_\Omega} u(\cdot,t) \ge 0}$ for a.e. t?>?0, and moreover, it is shown that this solution can be obtained through a Rothe-type approximation scheme. Furthermore, under an additional smallness condition on??? and ${\|f\|_{L^\infty(\Omega)}}$ , it is shown that there exists a bounded set ${S\subset L^1(\Omega)}$ which is absorbing for ${(\star)}$ in the sense that for any such solution, we can pick T?>?0 such that ${e^{2\lambda u(\cdot,t)}\in S}$ for all t?>?T, provided that ?? is a ball and u ₀ and f are radially symmetric with respect to x?=?0. This partially extends similar absorption results known in the spatially one-dimensional case. The techniques applied to derive appropriate compactness properties via a priori estimates include straightforward testing procedures which lead to integral inequalities involving, for instance, the functional ${{\int_\Omega} e^{2\lambda u}dx}$ , but also the use of a maximum principle for second-order elliptic equations.     

Morrey-type regularity of solutions to parabolic problems with discontinuous data

We consider regular oblique derivative problem in cylinder Q _T ?=????× (0, T), ${\Omega\subset {\mathbb R}^n}$ for uniformly parabolic operator ${{{\mathfrak P}}=D_t- \sum_{i,j=1}^n a^{ij}(x)D_{ij}}$ with VMO principal coefficients. Its unique strong solvability is proved in Manuscr. Math. 203?C220 (2000), when ${{{\mathfrak P}}u\in L^p(Q_T)}$ , ${p\in(1,\infty)}$ . Our aim is to show that the solution belongs to the generalized Sobolev?CMorrey space ${W^{2,1}_{p,\omega}(Q_T)}$ , when ${{{\mathfrak P}}u\in L^{p,\omega} (Q_T)}$ , ${p\in (1, \infty)}$ , ${\omega(x,r):\,{\mathbb R}^{n+1}_+\to {\mathbb R}_+}$ . For this goal an a priori estimate is obtained relying on explicit representation formula for the solution. Analogous result holds also for the Cauchy?CDirichlet problem.     

Singular limits for Liouville-type equations on the flat two-torus

We consider the problem $$\begin{aligned} -\Delta u=\varepsilon ^{2}e^{u}- \frac{1}{|\Omega |}\int _\Omega \varepsilon ^{2} e^{u}+ {4\pi N\over |\Omega |} - 4 \pi N\delta _p, \quad \text{ in} {\Omega }, \quad \int _\Omega u=0 \end{aligned}$$ in a flat two-torus $\Omega $ with periodic boundary conditions, where $\varepsilon >0,\,|\Omega |$ is the area of the $\Omega $ , $N>0$ and $\delta _p$ is a Dirac mass at $p\in \Omega $ . We prove that if $1\le m<N+1$ then there exists a family of solutions $\{u_\varepsilon \}_{\varepsilon }$ such that $\varepsilon ^{2}e^{u_\varepsilon }\rightharpoonup 8\pi \sum _{i=1}^m\delta _{q_i}$ as $\varepsilon \rightarrow 0$ in measure sense for some different points $q_{1}, \ldots , q_{m}$ . Furthermore, points $q_i$ , $i=1,\dots ,m$ are different from $p$ .     

Infinitely many solutions for an elliptic problem involving critical Sobolev growth and Hardy potential

In this paper, we will prove the existence of infinitely many solutions for the following elliptic problem with critical Sobolev growth and a Hardy potential: $$-\Delta u-\frac{\mu}{|x|^2}u = |u|^{2^{\ast}-2}u+a u\quad {\rm in}\;\Omega,\quad u=0 \quad {\rm on}\; \partial\Omega,\qquad (*)$$ under the assumptions that N ≥ 7, ${\mu\in \left[0,\frac{(N-2)^2}4-4\right)}$ and a > 0, where ${2^{\ast}=\frac{2N}{N-2}}$ , and Ω is an open bounded domain in ${\mathbb{R}^N}$ which contains the origin. To achieve this goal, we consider the following perturbed problem of (*), which is of subcritical growth, $$-\Delta u-\frac{\mu}{|x|^2}u = |u|^{2^{\ast}-2-\varepsilon_n}u+au \quad {\rm in}\,\Omega, \quad u=0 \quad {\rm on}\;\partial\Omega,\qquad(\ast\ast)_n$$ where ${\varepsilon_{n} > 0}$ is small and ${\varepsilon_n \to 0}$ as n → + ∞. By the critical point theory for the even functionals, for each fixed ${\varepsilon_{n} > 0}$ small, (**) _n has a sequence of solutions ${u_{k,\varepsilon_{n}} \in H^{1}_{0}(\Omega)}$ . We obtain the existence of infinitely many solutions for (*) by showing that as n → ∞, ${u_{k,\varepsilon_{n}}}$ converges strongly in ${H^{1}_{0}(\Omega)}$ to u _k , which must be a solution of (*). Such a convergence is obtained by applying a local Pohozaev identity to exclude the possibility of the concentration of ${\{u_{k,\varepsilon_n}\}}$ .     

True Poly-Bergman and Poly-Bergman Kernels for the Complement of a Closed Disk

Let $k$ and $j$ be positive integers. We prove that the action of the two-dimensional singular integral operators $(S_\Omega )^{j-1}$ and $(S_\Omega ^*)^{j-1}$ on a Hilbert base for the Bergman space $\mathcal{A }^2(\Omega )$ and anti-Bergman space $\mathcal{A }^2_{-1}(\Omega ),$ respectively, gives Hilbert bases $\{ \psi _{\pm j , k } \}_{ k }$ for the true poly-Bergman spaces $\mathcal{A }_{(\pm j)}^2(\Omega ),$ where $S_\Omega $ denotes the compression of the Beurling transform to the Lebesgue space $L^2(\Omega , dA).$ The functions $\psi _{\pm j,k}$ will be explicitly represented in terms of the $(2,1)$ -hypergeometric polynomials as well as by formulas of Rodrigues type. We prove explicit representations for the true poly-Bergman kernels and more transparent representations for the poly-Bergman kernels of $\Omega $ . We establish Rodrigues type formulas for the poly-Bergman kernels of $\mathbb{D }$ .     

p-Harmonic functions in the Heisenberg group: boundary behaviour in domains well-approximated by non-characteristic hyperplanes

In this paper we study, for given $p,~1<p<\infty $ , the boundary behaviour of non-negative $p$ -harmonic functions in the Heisenberg group $\mathbb{H }^n$ , i.e., we consider weak solutions to the non-linear and potentially degenerate partial differential equation $$\begin{aligned} \sum _{i=1}^{2n}X_i(|Xu|^{p-2}\,X_i u)=0 \end{aligned}$$ where the vector fields $X_1,\ldots ,X_{2n}$ form a basis for the space of left-invariant vector fields on $\mathbb{H }^n$ . In particular, we introduce a set of domains $\Omega \subset \mathbb{H }^n$ which we refer to as domains well-approximated by non-characteristic hyperplanes and in $\Omega $ we prove, for $2\le p<\infty $ , the boundary Harnack inequality as well as the Hölder continuity for ratios of positive $p$ -harmonic functions vanishing on a portion of $\partial \Omega $ .     

A priori estimates for a class of degenerate elliptic equations

In this paper we investigate the regularity of solutions for the following degenerate partial differential equation $$\left \{\begin{array}{ll} -\Delta_p u + u = f \qquad {\rm in} \,\Omega,\\ \frac{\partial u}{\partial \nu} = 0 \qquad \qquad \,\,\,\,\,\,\,\,\,\, {\rm on} \,\partial \Omega, \end{array}\right.$$ when ${f \in L^q(\Omega), p > 2}$ and q ≥ 2. If u is a weak solution in ${W^{1, p}(\Omega)}$ , we obtain estimates for u in the Nikolskii space ${\mathcal{N}^{1+2/r,r}(\Omega)}$ , where r = q(p ? 2) + 2, in terms of the L ^q norm of f. In particular, due to imbedding theorems of Nikolskii spaces into Sobolev spaces, we conclude that ${\|u\|^r_{W^{1 + 2/r - \epsilon, r}(\Omega)} \leq C(\|f\|_{L^q(\Omega)}^q + \| f\|^{r}_{L^q(\Omega)} + \|f\|^{2r/p}_{L^q(\Omega)})}$ for every ${\epsilon > 0}$ sufficiently small. Moreover, we prove that the resolvent operator is continuous and compact in ${W^{1,r}(\Omega)}$ .     

Regularity lifting of weak solutions for nonlinear sub-Laplace equations on homogeneous groups

Let G be a homogeneous group, and let X ₁, X ₂, … , X _m be left invariant real vector fields being homogeneous of degree one on G. We consider the following Dirichlet boundary value problem of the sub-Laplace equation involving the critical exponent and singular term: $$\left\{\begin{array}{ll}-\sum_{j=1}^{m}X_j^2u(x)-\frac{a}{\|x\|^\nu}u(x)=u^{\frac{Q+2}{Q-2}}(x), x\in\Omega,\\ u(x)=0, \quad\quad\quad\quad\quad\quad\quad\quad\quad\quad\quad\quad\,\,\,\, x\in \partial\Omega,\end{array}\right.$$ where ${\Omega\subset G}$ is a bounded domain with smooth boundary and ${\mathbf{0}\in\Omega}$ , Q is the homogeneous dimension of G, ${a\in \mathbb{R},\ \nu <2 }$ . We boost u to ${L^p(\Omega)}$ for any ${1\leq p < \infty}$ if ${u\in S^{1,2}_0(\Omega)}$ is a weak solution of the problem above.     

On functions whose symmetric part of gradient agree and a generalization of Reshetnyak’s compactness theorem

We consider the following question: Given a connected open domain ${\Omega \subset \mathbb{R}^n}$ , suppose ${u, v : \Omega \rightarrow \mathbb{R}^n}$ with det ${(\nabla u) > 0}$ , det ${(\nabla v) > 0}$ a.e. are such that ${\nabla u^T(x)\nabla u(x) = \nabla v(x)^T \nabla v(x)}$ a.e. , does this imply a global relation of the form ${\nabla v(x) = R\nabla u(x)}$ a.e. in Ω where ${R \in SO(n)}$ ? If u, v are C ¹ it is an exercise to see this true, if ${u, v\in W^{1,1}}$ we show this is false. In Theorem 1 we prove this question has a positive answer if ${v \in W^{1,1}}$ and ${u \in W^{1,n}}$ is a mapping of L ^p integrable dilatation for p > n ? 1. These conditions are sharp in two dimensions and this result represents a generalization of the corollary to Liouville’s theorem that states that the differential inclusion ${\nabla u \in SO(n)}$ can only be satisfied by an affine mapping. Liouville’s corollary for rotations has been generalized by Reshetnyak who proved convergence of gradients to a fixed rotation for any weakly converging sequence ${v_k \in W^{1,1}}$ for which $$\int \limits_{\Omega} {\rm dist}(\nabla v_k, SO(n))dz \rightarrow 0 \, {\rm as} \, k \rightarrow \infty.$$ Let S(·) denote the (multiplicative) symmetric part of a matrix. In Theorem 3 we prove an analogous result to Theorem 1 for any pair of weakly converging sequences ${v_k \in W^{1,p}}$ and ${u_k \in W^{1,\frac{p(n-1)}{p-1}}}$ (where ${p \in [1, n]}$ and the sequence (u _k ) has its dilatation pointwise bounded above by an L ^r integrable function, r > n ? 1) that satisfy ${\int_{\Omega} |S(\nabla u_k) - S(\nabla v_k)|^p dz \rightarrow 0}$ as k → ∞ and for which the sign of the det ${(\nabla v_k)}$ tends to 1 in L ¹. This result contains Reshetnyak’s theorem as the special case (u _k ) ≡ Id, p = 1.     

One-radius results for supermedian functions on {\mathbb R^d} , d ≤ 2

A classical result states that every lower bounded superharmonic function on ${\mathbb{R}^{2}}$ is constant. In this paper the following (stronger) one-circle version is proven. If ${f : \mathbb{R}^{2} \to (-\infty,\infty]}$ is lower semicontinuous, lim inf_|x|→∞ f (x)/ ln |x| ≥ 0, and, for every ${x \in \mathbb{R}^{2}}$ , ${1/(2\pi) \int_0^{2\pi} f(x + r(x)e^{it}) \, dt \le f(x)}$ , where ${r : \mathbb{R}^{2} \to (0,\infty)}$ is continuous, ${{\rm sup}_{x \in \mathbb{R}^{2}} (r(x) - |x|) < \infty},$ , and ${{\rm inf}_{x \in \mathbb{R}^{2}} (r(x)-|x|)=-\infty}$ , then f is constant. Moreover, it is shown that, assuming r ≤ c| · | + M on ${\mathbb{R}^d}$ , d ≤ 2, and taking averages on ${\{y \in \mathbb{R}^{d} : |y-x| \le r(x)\}}$ , such a result of Liouville type holds for supermedian functions if and only if c ≤ c ₀, where c ₀ = 1, if d = 2, whereas 2.50 < c ₀ < 2.51, if d = 1.     

Entropy numbers of Besov classes of generalized smoothness on the sphere

We investigate the asymptotic behavior of the entropy numbers of Besov classes BBΩp,θ(Sd 1)of generalized smoothness on the sphere inL q(Sd 1)for 1≤p,q,θ≤∞,and get their asymptotic orders.We also obtain the exact orders of entropy numbers of Sobolev classesBWr p(Sd 1)inL q(Sd 1)whenpand/orqis equal to 1 or∞.This provides the last piece as far as exact orders of entropy numbers ofBWr p(Sd 1)inL q(Sd 1)are concerned.