The results on Γ-limits of sequences of free-discontinuity functionals with bounded cohesive surface terms are extended to the case of vector-valued functions. In this framework, we prove an integral representation result for the Γ-limit, which is then used to study deterministic and stochastic homogenization problems for this type of functional.

We study the existence and regularity of minimizers of the neo-Hookean energy in the closure of classes of deformations without cavitation. The exclusion of cavitation is imposed in the form of the divergence identities, which is equivalent to the well-known condition (INV) with $\operatorname{Det} = \operatorname{det}$. We show that the neo-Hookean energy admits minimizers in classes of maps that are one-to-one a.e. with positive Jacobians, provided that these maps are the weak limits of sequences of maps that satisfy the divergence identities. In particular, these classes include the weak closure of diffeomorphisms and the weak closure of homeomorphisms satisfying Lusin’s condition N. Moreover, if the minimizers satisfy condition (INV), then their inverses have Sobolev regularity. This extends a recent result by Doležalová, Hencl, and Molchanova by showing that the minimizers they obtained enjoy extra regularity properties and that the existence of minimizers can still be obtained even when their coercivity assumption is relaxed.

$c$-cyclical monotonicity is the most important optimality condition for an optimal transport plan. While the proof of necessity is relatively easy, the proof of sufficiency is often more difficult or even elusive. We present here a new approach, and we show how known results are derived in this new framework and how this approach allows to prove sufficiency in situations previously not treatable.

Following the seminal paper by Bourgain, Brezis, and Mironescu, we focus on the asymptotic behaviour of some nonlocal functionals that, for each $u\in L^2(\mathbb {R}^N)$, are defined as the double integrals of weighted, squared difference quotients of $u$. Given a family of weights $\{\rho _{\varepsilon} \}$, $\varepsilon \in (0,\,1)$, we devise sufficient and necessary conditions on $\{\rho _{\varepsilon} \}$ for the associated nonlocal functionals to converge as $\varepsilon \to 0$ to a variant of the Dirichlet integral. Finally, some comparison between our result and the existing literature is provided.

We provide a fine description of the weak limit of sequences of regular axisymmetric maps with equibounded neo-Hookean energy, under the assumption that they have finite surface energy. We prove that these weak limits have a dipole structure, showing that the singular map described by Conti and De Lellis is generic in some sense. On this map, we provide the explicit relaxation of the neo-Hookean energy. We also make a link with Cartesian currents showing that the candidate for the relaxation we obtained presents strong similarities with the relaxed energy in the context of $\mathbb {S}^2$-valued harmonic maps.

We analyse the $\Gamma$-convergence of general non-local convolution type functionals with varying densities depending on the space variable and on the symmetrized gradient. The limit is a local free-discontinuity functional, where the bulk term can be completely characterized in terms of an asymptotic cell formula. From that, we can deduce an homogenisation result in the stochastic setting.

In this paper we consider the minimization of a novel class of fractional linear growth functionals involving the Riesz fractional gradient. These functionals lack the coercivity properties in the fractional Sobolev spaces needed to apply the direct method. We therefore utilize the recently introduced spaces of bounded fractional variation and study the extension of the linear growth functional to these spaces through relaxation with respect to the weak* convergence. Our main result establishes an explicit representation for this relaxation, which includes an integral term accounting for the singular part of the fractional variation and features the quasiconvex envelope of the integrand. The role of quasiconvexity in this fractional framework is explained by a technique to switch between the fractional and classical settings. We complement the relaxation result with an existence theory for minimizers of the extended functional.

The rigorous derivation of linear elasticity from finite elasticity by means of $\Gamma$-convergence is a well-known result, which has been extended to different models also beyond the elastic regime. However, in these results the applied forces are usually assumed to be dead loads, that is, their density in the reference configuration is independent of the actual deformation. In this paper we begin a study of the variational derivation of linear elasticity in the presence of live loads. We consider a pure traction problem for a nonlinearly elastic body subject to a pressure live load and we compute its linearization for small pressure by $\Gamma$-convergence. We allow for a weakly coercive elastic energy density and we prove strong convergence of minimizers.

We obtain a measure representation for a functional arising in the context of optimal design problems under linear growth conditions. The functional in question corresponds to the relaxation with respect to a pair $(\chi,u)$, where $\chi$ is the characteristic function of a set of finite perimeter and $u$ is a function of bounded deformation, of an energy with a bulk term depending on the symmetrized gradient as well as a perimeter term.

We study the $\Gamma$-convergence of nonconvex vectorial integral functionals whose integrands satisfy possibly degenerate growth and coercivity conditions. The latter involve suitable scale-dependent weight functions. We prove that under appropriate uniform integrability conditions on the weight functions, which shall belong to a Muckenhoupt class, the corresponding functionals $\Gamma$-converge, up to subsequences, to a degenerate integral functional defined on a limit weighted Sobolev space. The general analysis is then applied to the case of random stationary integrands and weights to prove a stochastic homogenization result for the corresponding functionals.

In this work we derive by $\Gamma$-convergence techniques a model for brittle fracture linearly elastic plates. Precisely, we start from a brittle linearly elastic thin film with positive thickness $\rho$ and study the limit as $\rho$ tends to $0$. The analysis is performed with no a priori restrictions on the admissible displacements and on the geometry of the fracture set. The limit model is characterized by a Kirchhoff-Love type of structure.

Starting from three-dimensional non-linear elasticity under the restriction of incompressibility, we derive reduced models to capture the behaviour of strings in response to external forces. Our Γ-convergence analysis of the constrained energy functionals in the limit of shrinking cross-sections gives rise to explicit one-dimensional limit energies. The latter depend on the scaling of the applied forces. The effect of local volume preservation is reflected either in their energy densities through a constrained minimization over the cross-section variables or in the class of admissible deformations. Interestingly, all scaling regimes allow for compression and/or stretching of the string. The main difficulty in the proof of the Γ-limit is to establish recovery sequences that accommodate the non-linear differential constraint imposed by the incompressibility. To this end, we modify classical constructions in the unconstrained case with the help of an inner perturbation argument tailored for 3d-1d dimension reduction problems.

In this paper we give sufficient conditions to obtain continuity results of solutions for the so called ϕ-Laplacian Δϕ with respect to domain perturbations. We point out that this kind of results can be extended to a more general class of operators including, for instance, nonlocal nonstandard growth type operators.

The asymptotic behavior of solutions to a family of Dirichlet boundary value problems, involving differential operators in divergence form, on a domain equipped with a Finsler metric is investigated. Solutions are shown to converge uniformly to the distance function to the boundary of the domain, which takes into account the Finsler norm involved in the equation. This implies that a well-known result in the analysis of problems modeling torsional creep continues to hold in this more general setting.

Under suitable assumptions on the family of anisotropies, we prove the existence of a weak global 1/(n+1)-Hölder continuous in time mean curvature flow with mobilities of a bounded anisotropic partition in any dimension using the method of minimizing movements. The result is extended to the case when suitable driving forces are present. We improve the Hölder exponent to 1/2 in the case of partitions with the same anisotropy and the same mobility and provide a weak comparison result in this setting for a weak anisotropic mean curvature flow of a partition and an anisotropic mean curvature two-phase flow.

We prove results on the relaxation and weak* lower semicontinuity of integral functionals of the form

$${\cal F}[u]: = \int_\Omegaf \left( {\displaystyle{1 \over 2}\left( {\nabla u(x) + \nabla u{(x)}^T} \right)} \right) \,{\rm d}x,\quad u:\Omega \subset {\mathbb R}^d\to {\mathbb R}^d,$$

$${\rm U}(\Omega ): = \left\{ {u\in {\rm BD}(\Omega ):\;\,{\rm div}\,u\in {\rm L}^2(\Omega )} \right\},$$

We show that the spectrum of the relativistic mean curvature operator on a bounded domain Ω ⊂ ℝN (N ⩾ 1) having smooth boundary, subject to the homogeneous Dirichlet boundary condition, is exactly the interval (λ1(2), ∞), where λ1(2) stands for the principal frequency of the Laplace operator in Ω.

In this note, we provide an explicit formula for computing the quasiconvex envelope of any real-valued function W; SL(2) → ℝ with W(RF) = W(FR) = W(F) for all F ∈ SL(2) and all R ∈ SO(2), where SL(2) and SO(2) denote the special linear group and the special orthogonal group, respectively. In order to obtain our result, we combine earlier work by Dacorogna and Koshigoe on the relaxation of certain conformal planar energy functions with a recent result on the equivalence between polyconvexity and rank-one convexity for objective and isotropic energies in planar incompressible nonlinear elasticity.

It is proved that c-cyclical monotonicity is a sufficient condition for optimality in the multi-marginal optimal transport problem with Coulomb repulsive cost. The notion of c-splitting set and some mild regularity property are the tools. The result may be extended to Coulomb like costs.

In this paper, we introduce a dynamical urban planning model. This leads to the study of a system of nonlinear equations coupled through multi-marginal optimal transport problems. A first example consists in solving two equations coupled through the solution to the Monge–Ampère equation. We show that theWasserstein gradient flow theory provides a very good framework to solve these highly nonlinear systems. At the end, a uniqueness result is presented in dimension one based on convexity arguments.