The Douglas–Rachford method is a splitting method frequently employed for finding zeros of sums of maximally monotone operators. When the operators in question are normal cone operators, the iterated process may be used to solve feasibility problems of the following form: Find $x\in \bigcap _{k=1}^{N}S_{k}$. The success of the method in the context of closed, convex, nonempty sets $S_{1},\ldots ,S_{N}$ is well known and understood from a theoretical standpoint. However, its performance in the nonconvex context is less well understood, yet it is surprisingly impressive. This was particularly compelling to Jonathan M. Borwein who, intrigued by Elser, Rankenburg and Thibault’s success in applying the method to solving sudoku puzzles, began an investigation of his own. We survey the current body of literature on the subject, and we summarize its history. We especially commemorate Professor Borwein’s celebrated contributions to the area.

Let Ω ⊂ ℝn be a bounded Lipschitz domain. Let $L: {\mathbb R}^n\rightarrow \bar {\mathbb R}= {\mathbb R}\cup \{+\infty \}$ be a continuous function with superlinear growth at infinity, and consider the functional $\mathcal {I}(u)=\int \nolimits _\Omega L(Du)$, u ∈ W1,1(Ω). We provide necessary and sufficient conditions on L under which, for all f ∈ W1,1(Ω) such that $\mathcal {I}(f) < +\infty $, the problem of minimizing $\mathcal {I}(u)$ with the boundary condition u|∂Ω = f has a solution which is stable, or – alternatively – is such that all of its solutions are stable. By stability of $\mathcal {I}$ at u we mean that $u_k\rightharpoonup u$ weakly in W1,1(Ω) together with $\mathcal {I}(u_k)\to \mathcal {I}(u)$ imply uk → u strongly in W1,1(Ω). This extends to general boundary data some results obtained by Cellina and Cellina and Zagatti. Furthermore, with respect to the preceding literature on existence results for scalar variational problems, we drop the assumption that the relaxed functional admits a continuous minimizer.

In this note, we provide an explicit formula for computing the quasiconvex envelope of any real-valued function W; SL(2) → ℝ with W(RF) = W(FR) = W(F) for all F ∈ SL(2) and all R ∈ SO(2), where SL(2) and SO(2) denote the special linear group and the special orthogonal group, respectively. In order to obtain our result, we combine earlier work by Dacorogna and Koshigoe on the relaxation of certain conformal planar energy functions with a recent result on the equivalence between polyconvexity and rank-one convexity for objective and isotropic energies in planar incompressible nonlinear elasticity.

It is proved that c-cyclical monotonicity is a sufficient condition for optimality in the multi-marginal optimal transport problem with Coulomb repulsive cost. The notion of c-splitting set and some mild regularity property are the tools. The result may be extended to Coulomb like costs.

In this article, the existence of heteroclinic solution of a class of generalized Hamiltonian system with potential $V : {\open R}^{n} \longmapsto {\open R}$ having a finite or infinite number of global minima is studied. Examples include systems involving the p-Laplacian operator, the curvature operator and the relativistic operator. Generalized conservation of energy is established, which leads to the property of equipartition of energy enjoyed by heteroclinic solutions. The existence problem of heteroclinic solution is studied using both variational method and the metric method. The variational approach is classical, while the metric method represents a more geometrical point of view where the existence problem of heteroclinic solution is reduced to that of geodesic in a proper length metric space. Regularities of the heteroclinic solutions are discussed. The results here not only provide alternative solution methods for Φ-Laplacian systems, but also improve existing results for the classical Hamiltonian system. In particular, the conditions imposed upon the potential are very mild and new proof for the compactness is given. Finally in ℝ2, heteroclinic solutions are explicitly written down in closed form by using complex function theory.

We consider a multimarginal transport problem with repulsive cost, where the marginals are all equal to a fixed probability $\unicode[STIX]{x1D70C}\in {\mathcal{P}}(\mathbb{R}^{d})$. We prove that, if the concentration of $\unicode[STIX]{x1D70C}$ is less than $1/N$, then the problem has a solution of finite cost. The result is sharp, in the sense that there exists $\unicode[STIX]{x1D70C}$ with concentration $1/N$ for which the cost is infinite.

We present the second-order necessary and sufficient conditions for quasiconvex and pseudoconvex functions in terms of their second-order regular subdifferentials.

In this paper, we introduce a dynamical urban planning model. This leads to the study of a system of nonlinear equations coupled through multi-marginal optimal transport problems. A first example consists in solving two equations coupled through the solution to the Monge–Ampère equation. We show that theWasserstein gradient flow theory provides a very good framework to solve these highly nonlinear systems. At the end, a uniqueness result is presented in dimension one based on convexity arguments.

As a continuation of previous work of the first author with Ranjbar [‘A variational inequality in complete CAT(0) spaces’, J. Fixed Point Theory Appl. 17 (2015), 557–574] on a special form of variational inequalities in Hadamard spaces, in this paper we study equilibrium problems in Hadamard spaces, which extend variational inequalities and many other problems in nonlinear analysis. In this paper, first we study the existence of solutions of equilibrium problems associated with pseudo-monotone bifunctions with suitable conditions on the bifunctions in Hadamard spaces. Then, to approximate an equilibrium point, we consider the proximal point algorithm for pseudo-monotone bifunctions. We prove existence of the sequence generated by the algorithm in several cases in Hadamard spaces. Next, we introduce the resolvent of a bifunction in Hadamard spaces. We prove convergence of the resolvent to an equilibrium point. We also prove $\triangle$-convergence of the sequence generated by the proximal point algorithm to an equilibrium point of the pseudo-monotone bifunction and also the strong convergence under additional assumptions on the bifunction. Finally, we study a regularization of Halpern type and prove the strong convergence of the generated sequence to an equilibrium point without any additional assumption on the pseudo-monotone bifunction. Some examples in fixed point theory and convex minimization are also presented.

This paper deals with the analysis of the singularities arising from the solutions of the problem ${-}\,{\rm Curl\ } F=\mu $, where F is a 3 × 3 matrix-valued Lp-function ($1\les p<2$) and μ a 3 × 3 matrix-valued Radon measure concentrated in a closed loop in Ω ⊂ ℝ3, or in a network of such loops (as, for instance, dislocation clusters as observed in single crystals). In particular, we study the topological nature of such dislocation singularities. It is shown that $F=\nabla u$, the absolutely continuous part of the distributional gradient Du of a vector-valued function u of special bounded variation. Furthermore, u can also be seen as a multi-valued field, that is, can be redefined with values in the three-dimensional flat torus 𝕋3 and hence is Sobolev-regular away from the singular loops. We then analyse the graphs of such maps represented as currents in Ω × 𝕋3 and show that their boundaries can be written in term of the measure μ. Readapting some well-known results for Cartesian currents, we recover closure and compactness properties of the class of maps with bounded curl concentrated on dislocation networks. In the spirit of previous work, we finally give some examples of variational problems where such results provide existence of solutions.

We discuss a variational model, given by a weighted sum of perimeter, bending and Riesz interaction energies, that could be considered as a toy model for charged elastic drops. The different contributions have competing preferences for strongly localized and maximally dispersed structures. We investigate the energy landscape in dependence of the size of the ‘charge’, that is, the weight of the Riesz interaction energy.

In the two-dimensional case, we first prove that for simply connected sets of small elastica energy, the elastica deficit controls the isoperimetric deficit. Building on this result, we show that for small charge the only minimizers of the full variational model are either balls or centred annuli. We complement these statements by a non-existence result for large charge. In three dimensions, we prove area and diameter bounds for configurations with small Willmore energy and show that balls are the unique minimizers of our variational model for sufficiently small charge.

In this short note, we prove that on the three-sphere with any bumpy metric there exist at least two pairs of solutions of the Allen–Cahn equation with spherical interface and index at most two. The proof combines several recent results from the literature.

The Ginzburg–Landau functional is a phase transition model which is suitable for classification type problems. We study the asymptotics of a sequence of Ginzburg–Landau functionals with anisotropic interaction potentials on point clouds Ψn where n denotes the number data points. In particular, we show the limiting problem, in the sense of Γ-convergence, is related to the total variation norm restricted to functions taking binary values, which can be understood as a surface energy. We generalize the result known for isotropic interaction potentials to the anisotropic case and add a result concerning the rate of convergence.

We consider a class of history-dependent quasivariational inequalities for which we prove the continuous dependence of the solution with respect to the set of constraints. Then, under additional assumptions, we associate with each inequality in the class a new inequality, the so-called dual variational inequality, for which we state and prove existence, uniqueness, equivalence and convergence results. The proofs are based on various estimates, monotonicity and fixed-point arguments for history-dependent operators. Our abstract results are useful in the study of various mathematical models of contact. To provide an example, we consider a boundary value problem which describes the equilibrium of a viscoelastic body in contact with an elastic-rigid foundation. We list the assumptions on the data and derive both the primal and the dual variational formulation of the problem. Then, we state and prove existence, uniqueness and convergence results. We also provide the link between the two formulations, together with their mechanical interpretation.

Minimizing movements are investigated for an energy which is the superposition of a convex functional and fast small oscillations. Thus a minimizing movement scheme involves a temporal parameter τ and a spatial parameter ε, with τ describing the time step and the frequency of the oscillations being proportional to 1/ε. The extreme cases of fast time scales τ ≪ ε and slow time scales ε ≪ τ have been investigated in [4]. In this paper, the intermediate (critical) case of finite ratio ε/τ > 0 is studied. It is shown that a pinning threshold exists, with initial data below the threshold being a fixed point of the dynamics. A characterization of the pinning threshold is given. For initial data above the pinning threshold, the equation and velocity describing the homogenized motion are determined.

In this paper, we study the existence, nonexistence and mass concentration of L2-normalized solutions for nonlinear fractional Schrödinger equations. Comparingwith the Schrödinger equation, we encounter some new challenges due to the nonlocal nature of the fractional Laplacian. We first prove that the optimal embedding constant for the fractional Gagliardo–Nirenberg–Sobolev inequality can be expressed by exact form, which improves the results of [17, 18]. By doing this, we then establish the existence and nonexistence of L2-normalized solutions for this equation. Finally, under a certain type of trapping potentials, by using some delicate energy estimates we present a detailed analysis of the concentration behavior of L2-normalized solutions in the mass critical case.

In this paper, we study the existence and multiplicity of solutions for Kirchhoff-type superlinear problems involving non-local integro-differential operators. As a particular case, we consider the following Kirchhoff-type fractional Laplace equation:

$$\matrix{ {\left\{ {\matrix{ {M\left( {\int\!\!\!\int\limits_{{\open R}^{2N}} {\displaystyle{{ \vert u(x)-u(y) \vert ^2} \over { \vert x-y \vert ^{N + 2s}}}} {\rm d}x{\rm d}y} \right){(-\Delta )}^su = f(x,u)\quad } \hfill & {{\rm in }\Omega ,} \hfill \cr {u = 0\quad } \hfill & {{\rm in }{\open R}^N{\rm \setminus }\Omega {\mkern 1mu} ,} \hfill \cr } } \right.} \hfill \cr } $$

$M:{\open R}_0^ + \to {\open R}^ + $

In this paper, we study a class of Brezis–Nirenberg problems for nonlocal systems, involving the fractional Laplacian $(-\unicode[STIX]{x1D6E5})^{s}$ operator, for $0<s<1$, posed on settings in which Sobolev trace embedding is noncompact. We prove the existence of infinitely many solutions in large dimension, namely when $N>6s$, by employing critical point theory and concentration estimates.

The consistency of a non-local anisotropic Ginzburg–Landau type functional for data classification and clustering is studied. The Ginzburg–Landau objective functional combines a double well potential, that favours indicator valued functions, and the p-Laplacian, that enforces regularity. Under appropriate scaling between the two terms, minimisers exhibit a phase transition on the order of ɛ = ɛn, where n is the number of data points. We study the large data asymptotics, i.e. as n → ∝, in the regime where ɛn → 0. The mathematical tool used to address this question is Γ-convergence. It is proved that the discrete model converges to a weighted anisotropic perimeter.

We consider a class of optimal control problems for measure-valued nonlinear transport equations describing traffic flow problems on networks. The objective is to minimise/maximise macroscopic quantities, such as traffic volume or average speed, controlling few agents, e.g. smart traffic lights and automated cars. The measure theoretic approach allows to study in a same setting local and non-local drivers interactions and to consider the control variables as additional measures interacting with the drivers distribution. We also propose a gradient descent adjoint-based optimisation method, obtained by deriving first-order optimality conditions for the control problem, and we provide some numerical experiments in the case of smart traffic lights for a 2–1 junction.