Michael G. Crandall

This volume provides the texts of lectures given by L. Ambrosio, L. Caffarelli, M. Crandall, L. C. Evans, N. Fusco at the Summer course held in Cetraro, Italy in 2005. These are introductory reports on current research by world leaders in the fields of calculus of variations and partial differential equations. Coverage includes transport equations for nonsmooth vector fields, viscosity methods for the infinite Laplacian, and geometrical aspects of symmetrization.

The volume comprises five extended surveys on the recent theory of viscosity solutions of fully nonlinear partial differential equations, and some of its most relevant applications to optimal control theory for deterministic and stochastic systems, front propagation, geometric motions and mathematical finance. The volume forms a state-of-the-art reference on the subject of viscosity solutions, and the authors are among the most prominent specialists. Potential readers are researchers in nonlinear PDE's, systems theory, stochastic processes.