A class of integral functionals with a \(W_0^{1,1}\)-minimum (Q2694438)

Summary: In this paper, we study the minimization of the integral functionals of the type \[ \int_{\Omega} \frac{\vert\nabla v\vert^2}{[1+B\vert v\vert]^2} + \frac{1}{2} \int_{\Omega} a(x)\vert v\vert^2 - \frac{1}{q} \int_{\Omega} \rho (x) \vert v\vert^q, \] where \(0 < B, 0 < a_0 \leq a (x) \in L_{\mathrm{loc}}^1 (\Omega), 0 \not\equiv \rho^+ (x) \in L^{\frac{2}{2-q}} (\Omega)\), and \(0 < q < 2\). The degeneracy of the principal part of the functional implies that it is not coercive in \(W_0^{1,2} (\Omega)\) and pushes to set and solve the minimization problem in \(W_0^{1,1} (\Omega)\) instead of the space \(W_0^{1,2} (\Omega)\). In addition, when the coefficients \(a(x)\) and \(\rho (x)\) are merely in \(L^1 (\Omega)\), but satisfy for some \(Q > 0\) the condition \(\vert\rho (x)\vert \leq Qa (x)\), we show the existence of a minimum of the functional which belongs to \(W_0^{1,2} (\Omega) \cap L^{\infty} (\Omega) \setminus \{ 0\}\).