Regularity for almost minimizers with free boundary

Abstract

In this paper we study the local regularity of almost minimizers of the functional \begin{equation*} J(u)=\int_\Omega |\nabla u(x)|^2 +q^2_+(x)\chi_{\{u>0\}}(x) +q^2_-(x)\chi_{\{u<0\}}(x) \end{equation*} where $q_\pm \in L^\infty(\Omega)$. Almost minimizers do not satisfy a PDE or a monotonicity formula like minimizers do (see \cite{AC}, \cite{ACF}, \cite{CJK}, \cite{W}). Nevertheless we succeed in proving that they are locally Lipschitz, which is the optimal regularity for minimizers.