Published online by Cambridge University Press: 15 September 2003
Lower semicontinuity results are obtained for multiple integrals of the kind $\int _{\mathbb{R}^n}\!f(x, \!\nabla_\mu u\!){\rm d} \mu$, where μ is a given positive measure on $\mathbb{R}^n$, and the vector-valued function u belongs to the Sobolev space $H ^{1,p}_\mu (\mathbb{R}^n, \mathbb{R}^m)$ associated with μ. The proofs are essentially based on blow-up techniques, and a significant role is played therein by the concepts of tangent space and of tangent measures to μ. More precisely, for fully general μ, a notion of quasiconvexity for f along the tangent bundle to μ, turns out to be necessary for lower semicontinuity; the sufficiency of such condition is also shown, when μ belongs to a suitable class of rectifiable measures.