Higher differentiability results for solutions to a class of non-autonomous obstacle problems with sub-quadratic growth conditions
Abstract We establish some higher differentiability results of integer and fractional order for solutions to non-autonomous obstacle problems of the form min { ∫ Ω f ( x , D v ( x ) ) : v ∈ K ψ ( Ω ) } , \min\biggl{\{}\int_{\Omega}f(x,Dv(x)):v\in\mathcal{K}_{\psi}(\Omega)\biggr{\}}, where the function 𝑓 satisfies 𝑝-growth conditions with respect to the gradient variable, for 1 < p < 2 1<p<2 , and K ψ ( Ω ) \mathcal{K}_{\psi}(\Omega) is the class of admissible functions v ∈ u 0 + W 0 1 , p ( Ω ) v\in u_{0}+W^{1,p}_{0}(\Omega) such that v ≥ ψ v\geq\psi a.e. in Ω, where u 0 ∈ W 1 , p ( Ω ) u_{0}\in W^{1,p}(\Omega) is a fixed boundary datum. Here we show that a Sobolev or Besov–Lipschitz regularity assumption on the gradient of the obstacle 𝜓 transfers to the gradient of the solution, provided the partial map x ↦ D ξ f ( x , ξ ) x\mapsto D_{\xi}f(x,\xi) belongs to a suitable Sobolev or Besov space. The novelty here is that we deal with sub-quadratic growth conditions with respect to the gradient variable, i.e. f ( x , ξ ) ≈ a ( x ) | ξ | p f(x,\xi)\approx a(x)\lvert\xi\rvert^{p} with 1 < p < 2 1<p<2 , and where the map 𝑎 belongs to a Sobolev or Besov–Lipschitz space.
