\(C^{2,\alpha}\) estimates for nonlinear elliptic equations of twisted type (Q262229)

The paper is devoted to the question for interior regularity for solutions of the nonlinear uniformly elliptic equation \(F(D^2 u)=0\). Under the assumption that \(F\) is convex or concave a well-known result of Evans-Krylov says, that the Hölder norm \(\|\cdot\|_{C^\alpha(G_1)}\), \(\alpha \in (0,1)\), of \(D^2 u\) on a domain \(G_1\), \(\overline{G_1} \subset G\), can be controlled by the \(L^\infty(G)\) norm of \(D^2 u\) on \(G\), where \(G\) is supposed to be a bounded domain. Counter-examples show that such a result cannot be expected for general fully nonlinear elliptic equations. For this reason it is interesting to prove Evans-Krylov type results for \(F(D^2 u)\), where \(F\) is neither convex nor concave. The author proves such a result for so-called \(F\) which are of twisted type. One example are \(F\) which have the representation \(F=F_1+F_2\), where \(F_1\) is a smooth convex uniformly elliptic operator and \(F_2\) is a smooth concave degenerate elliptic operator. The main steps of the proof are {\parindent=0.6cm \begin{itemize}\item[1.] the consideration of the linearization of \(F(D^2 u)=0\), \item[2.] the construction of a supersolution of the linearized equation, \item[3.] the extension of convex elliptic operators, \item[4.] the proof of the Evans-Krylov theorem, \item[5.] the application of small perturbations. \end{itemize}} Finally, the result is extended to the uniformly elliptic equation \(F(x,D^2u)=0\). Applications of the results can be found in differential geometry.