Variational models for pattern formation in materials

The formation of patterns or microstructures in materials can often be understood as the result of a competition between different energy contributions, for example an elastic bulk energy and a (higher order) surface energy. Among many others, typical examples include microstrcuctures in shape-memory alloys, shape formation in elastically strained thin crystalline films, and the formation of rafts in biomembranes. In this talk, I shall discuss some recent analytical results on the associated variational problems, which typically involve vectorial, non-convex nonlinear functionals.