Strikte Konvexität für Variationsprobleme auf dem \(n\)-dimensionalen Torus. (Strict convexity for variational problems on the \(n\)-dimensional torus) (Q2276748)

We consider a variational problem \(\int F(x,u(x),u_ x(x))dx\) with integrand F: \(R^ n\times R\times R^ n\to R\) that is Z-periodic in the first \(n+1\) variables and satisfies certain growth conditions. By a result of \textit{J. Moser} [Ann. Inst. Henri Poincaré, Anal. Non Linéaire 3, 229-272 (1986; Zbl 0609.49029)] there exist for every rotation vector \(\alpha \in R^ n\) minimal solutions u: \(R^ n\to R\) minimising \(\int F(x,u,u_ x)dx\) with respect to compactly supported variations of u and such that the graph of u is in finite distance to the hyperplane (x,\(\alpha\) x), \(x\in {\mathbb{R}}^ n\). Given such a minimal solution u we define the (minimal) average action \[ M(\alpha)=\lim_{r\to \infty}\frac{1}{| B_ r|}\int_{B_ r}F(x,u,u_ x)dx \] (where \(B_ r\) is the r-ball around \(0\in {\mathbb{R}}^ n)\) which indeed does not depend on the minimal solution u satisfying \(\sup | u(x)-\alpha x| <\infty\). We prove that this average action M(\(\alpha\)) is strictly convex as function of the rotation vector \(\alpha\).