Model problems from nonlinear elasticity : partial regularity results

Carozza, Menita; Passarelli Di Napoli, Antonia

ESAIM: Control, Optimisation and Calculus of Variations, Tome 13 (2007) no. 1, pp. 120-134.

In this paper we prove that every weak and strong local minimizer $u\in W^{1,2}(\Omega ,{ℝ}^3)$ of the functional $I\left(u\right)={\int }_{\Omega }{\left|Du\right|}^2+f\left(\mathrm{Adj}Du\right)+g\left(\det Du\right),$ where $u:\Omega \subset {ℝ}^3\to {ℝ}^3$, $f$ grows like ${\left|\mathrm{Adj}Du\right|}^p$, $g$ grows like ${\left|\det Du\right|}^q$ and $1<q<p<2$, is $C^{1,\alpha }$ on an open subset ${\Omega }_0$ of $\Omega$ such that $\mathrm{𝑚𝑒𝑎𝑠}(\Omega \setminus {\Omega }_0)=0$. Such functionals naturally arise from nonlinear elasticity problems. The key point in order to obtain the partial regularity result is to establish an energy estimate of Caccioppoli type, which is based on an appropriate choice of the test functions. The limit case $p=q\le 2$ is also treated for weak local minimizers.

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