On the \(\Gamma\)-convergence for multiple integrals depending on vector valued functions (Q790416)

In the paper the functionals \[ F_ h(\Omega u)=\int_{\Omega}f_ h(x,Du)dx \] are considered, where \(\Omega\) is an open bounded set in \(R^ n\) with a smooth boundary, u is a vector in the Sobolev space \(H^{1p}(\Omega,R^ N)\) and Du denotes the gradient of u; that is \(Du=(D_{\alpha}u^ i)\), \(\alpha =1,...,n\), \(i=1,...,N\). It is proved that under suitable regularity conditions the \(\Gamma\)-convergence of the sequence \(F_ h(\Omega,u)_{h=1,2,...}\) in the \(L^ p\) topology is equivalent to the \(\Gamma\)-convergence of the sequence in the \(L^{\infty}\) topology; that is for any \(u\in C^ 1({\bar \Omega},R^ N)\) we have \[ \Gamma^-(L^ p(\Omega,R^ N))\lim_{h}F_ h(\Omega,u)=\Gamma^-(L^{\infty}(\Omega,R^ N))\lim_{h}F_ h(\Omega,u). \] In the case \(N=1\) such a theorem was obtained by De Giorgi for a more general class of functionals of type \(F_ h(\Omega,u)=\int_{\Omega}f_ h(x,u,Du)dx.\) The obtained results are applied to obtain convergence of solutions of some variational inequalities which are related to obstacle problems. The author's theorem of this type generalizes to the N-dimensional case \((N>1)\), some previous results (for \(N=1)\) of Boccardo-Marcellini and others.