We present, analyze, and implement a new method for the design of the stiffest structure subject to a pressure load or a given field of internal forces. Our structure is represented as a subset $S$ of a reference domain, and the complement of $S$ is made of two other “phases”, the “void” and a fictitious “liquid” that exerts a pressure force on its interface with the solid structure. The problem we consider is to minimize the compliance of the structure $S$, which is the total work of the pressure and...

We present, analyze, and implement a new method for the design of the stiffest structure subject to a pressure load or a given field of internal forces. Our structure is represented as a subset S of a reference domain, and the complement of S is made of two other “phases”, the “void” and a fictitious “liquid” that exerts a pressure force on its interface with the solid structure. The problem we consider is to minimize the compliance of the structure S, which is the total work of the pressure...

In the present paper, we consider nonlinear optimal control problems with constraints on the state of the system. We are interested in the characterization of the value function without any controllability assumption. In the unconstrained case, it is possible to derive a characterization of the value function by means of a Hamilton-Jacobi-Bellman (HJB) equation. This equation expresses the behavior of the value function along the trajectories arriving or starting from any position x. In the constrained...

In the present paper, we consider nonlinear optimal control problems with constraints on the state of the system. We are interested in the characterization of the value function without any controllability assumption. In the unconstrained case, it is possible to derive a characterization of the value function by means of a Hamilton-Jacobi-Bellman (HJB) equation. This equation expresses the behavior of the value function along the trajectories arriving or starting from any position x. In...

We consider a function $u:\Omega \to {ℝ}^N$, $\Omega \subset {ℝ}^n$, minimizing the integral ${\int }_{\Omega }\left(\right|D_1{u|}^2+\cdots +|D_{n-1}{u|}^2+|D_{n}u{|}^p)dx$, $2(n+1)/(n+3)\le p<2$, where $D_{i}u=\partial u/\partial x_i$, or some more general functional with the same behaviour; we prove the existence of second weak derivatives $D\left(D_{1}u\right),\cdots ,D\left(D_{n-1}u\right)\in L^2$ and $D\left(D_{n}u\right)\in L^p$.

The convex optimal control problem for a system described by the parabolic equation is considered. The form of the right derivative of an optimal solution with respect to the parameter is derived. The applications to an air quality control problem are discussed. Numerical result are provided.

We study integral functionals constrained to divergence-free vector fields in Lp on a thin domain, under standard p-growth and coercivity assumptions, 1 &lt; p &lt; ∞. We prove that as the thickness of the domain goes to zero, the Gamma-limit with respect to weak convergence in Lp is always given by the associated functional with convexified energy density wherever it is finite. Remarkably, this happens despite the fact that relaxation of nonconvex functionals subject to the limiting constraint...

We study integral functionals constrained to divergence-free vector fields in Lp on a thin domain, under standard p-growth and coercivity assumptions, 1 < p < ∞. We prove that as the thickness of the domain goes to zero, the Gamma-limit with respect to weak convergence in Lp is always given by the associated functional with convexified energy density wherever it is finite. Remarkably, this happens despite the fact that relaxation of nonconvex functionals subject to the limiting constraint...

A 3D-2D dimension reduction for −Δ1 is obtained. A power law approximation from −Δp as p → 1 in terms of Γ-convergence, duality and asymptotics for least gradient functions has also been provided.

The purpose of this note is to discuss the relationship among Rosenthal's modulus of uniform integrability, Young measures and DiPerna-Majda measures. In particular, we give an explicit characterization of this modulus and state a criterion of the uniform integrability in terms of these measures. Further, we show applications to Fatou's lemma.

The Mumford-Shah functional, introduced to study image segmentation problems, is approximated in the sense of vergence by a sequence of integral functionals defined on piecewise affine functions.

We investigate the relationship between a discrete version of thickness and its smooth counterpart. These discrete energies are deffned on equilateral polygons with n vertices. It will turn out that the smooth ropelength, which is the scale invariant quotient of length divided by thickness, is the Γ-limit of the discrete ropelength for n → ∞, regarding the topology induced by the Sobolev norm ‖ · ‖ W1,∞(S1,ℝd). This result directly implies the convergence of almost minimizers of the discrete energies...

We explicitly introduce and exploit div-curl Young measures to examine optimal design problems governed by a linear state law in divergence form. The cost is allowed to depend explicitly on the gradient of the state. By means of this family of measures, we can formulate a suitable relaxed version of the problem, and, in a subsequent step, put it in a similar form as the original optimal design problem with an appropriate set of designs and generalized state law. Many of the issues involved has been...