Global Sobolev regularity for general elliptic equations of \(p\)-Laplacian type (Q1800881)

The main purpose of the paper is to obtain global gradient estimates for \(W_0^{1,p}(\Omega)\)-weak solutions to the following Dirichlet problem \[ \begin{cases} \text{div}\, {\mathbf a} (x,u,Du)=\text{div} (|F|^{p-2}\,F)\quad \text{in}\quad \Omega,\\ u=0,\quad \text{on}\quad \partial\Omega, \end{cases}\tag{1} \] where \(\Omega\subset\mathbb{R}^n\), \(n\geq 2\), is a bounded domain, \({\mathbf a}:\mathbb{R}^n\times \mathbb{R}\times \mathbb{R}^n\to \mathbb{R}^n\) is a Carathéodory map, \(p>1\) is an arbitrary exponent and \(F\in L^p(\Omega,\mathbb{R}^n)\). More precisely, the following is assumed: (i) \({\mathbf a}(x,uz,\xi)=\big(a^1(x,z,\xi),\cdots, a^n(x,z,\xi)\big)\) is differentiable with respect to \(\xi\neq 0\), and \(D_{\xi} {\mathbf a}\) is a Carathéodory map. (ii) There exists \(\gamma>0\) such that \(\displaystyle \gamma |\xi|^{p-2} |\eta|^2\leq \big(D_{\xi} {\mathbf a}(x,z,\xi) \eta, \eta\big)\), and \(\displaystyle |{\mathbf a}(x,z,\xi)|+|\xi| |D_{\xi} {\mathbf a}(x,z,\xi)|\leq \gamma^{-1} |\xi|^{p-1} \) for a.a. \(x\in\Omega\) and for all \((z,\xi)\in \mathbb{R}\times \mathbb{R}\setminus\{0\}\) and \(\eta \in\mathbb{R}^n\). (iii) \(\displaystyle \big( {\mathbf a}(x,z,\xi_1)-{\mathbf a}(x,z,\xi_2),\xi_1-\xi_2\big)\geq \begin{cases} \tilde{\gamma}\,|\xi_1-\xi_2|^p \quad \text{if}\quad p\geq 2,\\ \tilde{\gamma}\,|\xi_1-\xi_2|^2\,\big(|\xi_1|+|\xi_2|\big)^{p-2}\quad \text{if}\quad 1<p\geq 2, \end{cases} \) \newline where \(\tilde{\gamma}\) depends only on \(\gamma\), \(n\) and \(p\). (iv) For each \(M>0\) there is a non-decreasing function \(\omega_M: \mathbb{R}^+\mapsto \mathbb{R}^+\) with \(\displaystyle \lim\limits_{\rho\to 0^+}\,\omega_{M}(\rho)=0\) such that \(\displaystyle |{\mathbf a}(x,z_1,\xi)-{\mathbf a}(x,z_2,\xi)|\leq \omega_M\big(|z_1-z_2|\big)\,|\xi|^{p-1} \) for a.a. \(x\in \Omega\), for all \(z_1, z_2 \in[-M,M]\) and \(\xi\in \mathbb{R}^n\). (v) For each \(M>0\) there exist \(R>0\) and \(\delta>0\) depending on \(M\), such that \[ \sup\limits_{z\in[-M,M]}\,\sup\limits_{0<\rho\leq R}\,\sup\limits_{y\in\mathbb{R}^n}\,\frac{1}{|B_{\rho}(y)|}\, \int\limits_{B_{\rho}(y)}\,\sup\limits_{\xi\in\mathbb{R}^n\setminus\{0\}}\frac{|{\mathbf a}(x,z,\xi)-{\mathbf {\bar a}}_{B_{\rho}(y)}(z,\xi)|}{|\xi|^{p-1}}\,dx\leq \delta, \] where \(\displaystyle {\mathbf {\bar a}}_{B_{\rho}(y)}(z,\xi)=\frac{1}{|B_{\rho}(y)|}\,\int\limits_{B_{\rho}(y)}{\mathbf a}(x,z,\xi)\,dx.\) Also it is assumed that the boundary \(\partial\Omega\) is \((\delta, R)\)-Reifenberg flat. This means that for each \(x_0\in\partial\Omega\) and each \(\rho\in(0,R)\) there is a local coordinate system \(\{x_1,\cdots,x_n\}\) with origin at the point \(x_0\) such that \(\displaystyle B_{\rho}(x_0)\cap\{x:x_n>\rho\,\delta\}\subset B_{\rho}(x_0)\cap\Omega\subset B_{\rho}(x_0)\cap\{x:x_n>-\rho\,\delta\}\). Under the above assumptions the authors prove that, for each bounded weak solution \(u\in W_0^{1,p}(\Omega)\cap L^{\infty}(\Omega)\) of (1) such that \(\| u\|_{L^{\infty}(\Omega)}\leq M\) and \(|F|^p\in L^q(\Omega)\) for some \(q\in(1,\infty)\), the gradient \(Du\) belongs to \(L^{p q}(\Omega)\) and \(\displaystyle \int\limits_{\Omega}\,|Du|^{p q}\,dx\leq C \,\int\limits_{\Omega}\,|F|^{p q}\,dx\) with \(C\) depending on \(\gamma\), \(n\), \(p\), \(q\), \(M\), \(\omega_{M}(\cdot)\) and \(|\Omega|\). This result improves the results known in the literature by the fact that the authors weaken the regularity conditions on the operator \({\mathbf a}\) as well as the geometric conditions on the boundary.