Partial Differential Equations And The Calculus of Variations

This textbook provides a solid foundation to a number of important topics in mathematics of interest to science and engineering students. Included are tensor algebra, ordinary differential equations, contour integration, Laplace and Fourier transforms, partial differential equations and the calculus of variations.

This volume contains 18 invited papers by members and guests of the former Sonderforschungsbereich in Bonn (SFB 72) who, over the years, collaborated on the research group "Solution of PDE's and Calculus of Variations". The emphasis is on existence and regularity results, on special equations of mathematical physics and on scattering theory.

This is the first of two books on methods and techniques in the calculus of variations. Contemporary arguments are used throughout the text to streamline and present in a unified way classical results, and to provide novel contributions at the forefront of the theory.

This is the first of two books on methods and techniques in the calculus of variations. Contemporary arguments are used throughout the text to streamline and present in a unified way classical results, and to provide novel contributions at the forefront of the theory.

Based on recent research by the author and his graduate students, this text describes novel variational formulations and resolutions of a large class of partial differential equations and evolutions, many of which are not amenable to the methods of the classical calculus of variations. While it contains many new results, the general and unifying framework of the approach, its versatility in solving a disparate set of equations, and its reliance on basic functional analytic principles, makes it suitable for an intermediate level graduate course. The applications, however, require a fair knowledge of classical analysis and PDEs which is needed to make judicious choices of function spaces where the self-dual variational principles need to be applied. It is the author's hope that this material will become standard for all graduate students interested in convexity methods for PDEs.

Based on recent research by the author and his graduate students, this text describes novel variational formulations and resolutions of a large class of partial differential equations and evolutions, many of which are not amenable to the methods of the classical calculus of variations. While it contains many new results, the general and unifying framework of the approach, its versatility in solving a disparate set of equations, and its reliance on basic functional analytic principles, makes it suitable for an intermediate level graduate course. The applications, however, require a fair knowledge of classical analysis and PDEs which is needed to make judicious choices of function spaces where the self-dual variational principles need to be applied. It is the author's hope that this material will become standard for all graduate students interested in convexity methods for PDEs.