Neumann problems for nonlinear elliptic equations with \(L^1\) data (Q2343523)

In this article, the following nonlinear elliptic Neumann problem is considered: \[ \begin{cases} -\mathrm{div}(\mathbf{a}(x,u, \nabla u)+ \Phi(x,u))=f &\text{ in }\Omega, \\ (\mathbf{a}(x,u,\nabla u)+\Phi(x,u))\cdot \underline{n}=0 &\text{ on }\partial \Omega, \end{cases} \] where \(\Omega\) is a connected open subset in \(\mathbb{R}^N\), \(N \geq 2\), having finite measure and Lipschitz boundary, \(\underline{n}\) is the outer unit normal to \(\partial \Omega\), and \(\mathbf{a}: \Omega \times \mathbb{R} \times \mathbb{R}^N \rightarrow \mathbb{R}^N\); \(\Phi:\Omega \times \mathbb{R} \rightarrow \mathbb{R}^N\) are Carathéodory functions. Moreover \(\mathbf{a} (x,s,\xi) \cdot \xi \geq \alpha |\xi|^p\), \(\forall s \in \mathbb{R}, \forall \xi \in \mathbb{R}^N\), a.e. in \(\Omega\) with \(\alpha > 0\) being a given real number and \(1 < p \leq N\); \((\mathbf{a} (x,s,\xi) - \mathbf{a}(x,s,\eta)) \cdot (\xi - \eta) \geq 0\), \(\forall s \in \mathbb{R}, \forall \xi, \eta \in \mathbb{R}^N\) with \(\xi \not = \eta\) and a.e. in \(\Omega\); and for any \(k > 0\) there exist \(a_k > 0\) and \(b_k\) belonging to \(L^{p'}(\Omega)\) such that \(|\mathbf{a}(x,s,\xi)| \leq a_k |\xi|^{p-1} + b_k(x)\), \(\forall |s|<k\), \(\forall \xi \in \mathbb{R}^N\), a.e. in \(\Omega\). Also \(|\Phi(x,s)| \leq c(x) (1 + |s|^{p-1})\) \(\forall s \in \mathbb{R}\), a.e. in \(\Omega\) with \(c \in L^{\frac{N}{p-1}}(\Omega)\) if \(p < N\) and \(c \in L^q(\Omega)\) with \(q > \frac{N}{N-1}\) if \(p = N\). When \(f\) is not an element of the dual space of the classical Sobolev space \(W^{1,p}(\Omega)\) or is just an \(L^1\)-function, the classical notation of weak solution does not fit, instead a renormalized solution \(u\) is defined to satisfy: \(u\) is measurable and finite a.e. in \(\Omega\), \(T_k(u) \in W^{1,p}(\Omega)\) for any \(k > 0\) (\(T_k(s) = \min(k, \max(s, -k))\), \(\forall s \in \mathbb{R}\), \(k \geq 0\), i.e. the truncation at height \(k\)), \[ \lim_{n \rightarrow +\infty} \frac{1}{n} \int_{ \{ x \in \Omega; |u(x)| < n \} } \mathbf{a} (x,u,\nabla u) \nabla u dx = 0 \] and if for every function \(h \in W^{1,\infty}(\mathbb{R})\) with compact support and for every \(\phi \in L^\infty(\Omega) \cap W^{1,p}(\Omega)\), \(u\) it holds \[ \begin{multlined}\int_\Omega h(u) \mathbf{a}(x,u,\nabla u) \nabla \phi dx + \int_\Omega h'(u)\mathbf{a}(x,u,\nabla u) \nabla u \phi dx \\ + \int_\Omega h(u) \Phi(x,u) \nabla \phi dx + \int_\Omega h'(u) \Phi(x,u) \nabla u \phi dx = \int_\Omega f \phi h(u) dx.\end{multlined} \] Based on a procedure of approximation \(f\) in \(L^1\) by smooth functions, the main result of this article is: If \(f \in L^1(\Omega)\) with \(\int_\Omega f dx = 0\), then there exists at least one renormalized solution \(u\) faving \(\mathrm{med}(u) = 0\), where \[ \mathrm{med}(u) = \sup \{ t \in \mathbb{R}:\mathrm{meas}\{ x \in \Omega: u(x) > t \}> \frac{\mathrm{meas}(\Omega)}{2} \}. \] Also a stability result is given: under larger assumption on the summability of \(f\), a renormalized solution is in turn a weak solution to the same problem.