Chapter 1

Distributions on open sets of R

d
. . . For the Fourier transform, the introduction of distribution (hence
the space S) is inevitable either in an explicit or hidden form. . . As a
result one may obtain all that is desired from the point of view of the
continuity and inversion of the Fourier transform.
Laurent Schwartz (1915-2002)
The theory of distributions has been introduced by L. Schwartz (1915-2002) ca. 1944-1950 as ob-
jects which generalize functions [Schwartz, 1945, Schwartz, 1966]. They extend the notion of derivative
to all integrable functions and are now widely used to formulate generalized solutions of partial dier-
ential equations. The Lebesgue L
p
spaces contain non regular and non continuous functions for which
derivatives are not dened in the classical sense. Nonetheless, the classical derivatives generally exist
almost everywhere. It seems then reasonable to generalize the notion of derivative to be independent of
zero-measure subsets. This leads to the concept of weak derivative introduced by J. Leray (1906-1998)
and S.L. Sobolev (1908-1989). The main concept underlying the notion of weak derivative is the concept
of distributions.
Contents
1.1 Innitely smooth functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
1.2 The concept of distribution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
According to [Schwartz, 1966], O. Heaviside (1850-1925) introduced in 1894 a function denoted H and
called the unit step function. It corresponds to the characteristic function of the interval [0, +[ of R and
is a discontinuous function whose value is zero for negative argument and one for positive argument (cf.
Figure 1.1). This function has no derivative at the origin. Nonetheless, Heaviside dened the derivative
H

of H at any point in R, and called it the unit impulse function, as:

H

(x) =
_
0 x = 0
+ x = 0
(1.1)
This function H cannot be considered as a usual function. Since H

vanishes almost everywhere, it should

be assigned integral zero:
_
a
a
H

(x) dx = 0 , a ]0, +[ . (1.2)

3
4 Chapter 1. Distributions on open sets of R
d
Furthermore, we have:
_
a
a
H

(x) dx = H(a) H(a) = 1 , a ]0, +[ . (1.3)

Actually, the function H

has been reintroduced by P. Dirac (1902-1984) in 1926 and is widely used in the
context of quantum physics, where it is called the Dirac delta function, denoted . It has the following
property:
_
+

f(x)(x) dx = f(0) ,
for all continuous functions f. However, there is no function verifying this property.
The purpose of the distribution theory is to eradicate all these contradictions by giving a rigorous
denition of generalized functions, called distributions. Distributions have the remarkable property of
being all indenitely dierentiable (in a certain sense). Furthermore, an noteworthy property is that the
derivation is a continuous operation in the distribution space.
x
a
1
H(x a)
x
a a + a
0
h
f(x)
Figure 1.1: The Heaviside step function (left) and the impulse function (right).
1.1 Innitely smooth functions
I this section, we review some basic notions of dierential calculus and we introduce the denition of
function with compact support
1
.
1.1.1 Dierential calculus
Let consider an open subset R
d
. We denote by L(R
d
, R
m
) the vector space of linear maps. This
space becomes a Banach space when endowed with the norm:
u
L(R
d
,R
m
)
= sup
x<1
ux , u L(R
d
, R
m
) .
1
This presentation has been inspired by various lecture notes, in particular those of J.-M. Bony, Analyse, Ecole Polytech-
nique, Palaiseau, of M. Tucsnak, Distributions et equations fondamentales de la physique, Institut Elie Cartan, Universite
Nancy I and of J.-Y. Chemin, Analyse reelle, UPMC, Paris.
1.1. Innitely smooth functions 5
Denition 1.1 The function f : R
d
R
m
is said to be dierentiable at x if there exists an
element f

(x) L(R
d
, R
m
) such that
f(x +h) f(x) f

(x)h = o(h) , h 0 .
Lemma 1.1 If f : R is dierentiable at x
0
, then f has a partial derivative with respect to x
j
at x
0
and
f
x
j
(x
0
) = f

(x
0
)e
j
, j {1, . . . , d} ,
where (e
1
, . . . , e
d
) denotes the canonical basis of R
d
. Moreover, we have
f

(x
0
)v = f(x
0
), v , v R
d
,
the vector f(x
0
) =
d

j=1
f
x
j
(x
0
)e
j
is the gradient of f at x
0
,
Proposition 1.1 Suppose I is an open interval of R and f is continuous in I and dierentiable except
at point x
0
I. If x I and lim
xx
0
f

(x) = a R, then f

(x
0
) exists and we have f

(x
0
) = a.
Denition 1.2 Consider an open subset R
d
and k N. A function f C
k
() if one of the
following conditions holds:
(i) k = 0 and f is continuous on ,
(ii) k 1 and f has partial derivatives
f
x
j
, j = 1, . . . , d that are in C
k1
().
Moreover, f C

() if f C
k
() for all k N.
Lemma 1.2 (Schwarz) If f C
2
() then

2
f
x
i
x
j
=

2
f
x
j
x
i
, i, j {1, . . . , d} .
Notice that if f C
k
(, this lemma refers to the property of interchanging the order of taking partial
derivatives of a function. The matrix of second-order partial derivatives of f is called the Hessian matrix.
In most cases, this matrix is a symmetric matrix.
Theorem 1.1 (Taylors formula) Let be an open subset of R
d
, m N and f C
m+1
(). Consider
x, y such that x +ty , for all t [0, 1]. Then, we have:
f(x +y) =

||m
y

f(x) + (m+ 1)

||=m+1
y

!
_
1
0
(1 t)
m

f(x +ty) dt . (1.4)

Corollary 1.1 Let be an open subset of R
d
, f C
m+1
() and K a compact subset of . Consider
x, y K such that [x, x +y] K. Then, there exists a constant C = C(K, m, f) such that

f(x +y)

||m
y

f(x)

Cy
m+1
. (1.5)
Corollary 1.2 If f C
k
(B) where B = {x R
d
, x < 1}, then there exists f
1
, . . . , f
d
C
k1
(B) such
that:

f
j
(0) =

j
f(0)
1 + ||
, sup
xB
|

f
j
| sup
xB
|

j
f| , j = 1, . . . , d f(x) f(0) =
d

j=1
x
j
f
j
(x) .
6 Chapter 1. Distributions on open sets of R
d
1.1.2 Existence of C

functions
Let R
d
be an open set. We recall that the set of innitely smooth functions is dened as:
C

() =

k0
C
k
() .
Denition 1.3 Given u C
0
(), the support of u, denoted as Supp(u), is dened as the closure of the
set {x , u(x) = 0} in . It is the smallest closed subset of such that u = 0 in \ Supp(u).
Notice that if x Supp(u), then there exists a sequence (x
n
)
nN
such that u(x
n
) = 0 for all n N
and such that lim
n
x
n
= x.
Denition 1.4 If k N {+}, the space C
k
0
() is composed of all functions u C
k
() having a
compact subset of as support. The elements of C

0
(), hereafter denoted by D(), are called test
functions.
It is common to nd the notations C

0
() or C

c
() instead of the symbol D(). Every function
u C
k
0
() can be extended to a function of C
k
0
(R
d
). Thus, C
k
0
() can be seen as a subspace of C
k
0
(R
d
).
In this respect, given an open set R
d
, the set C
k
0
() can be dened as the set of elements u C
k
0
(R
d
)
for which Supp(u) .
The space D() is not empty. Indeed, we have the following result.
Lemma 1.3 There exists a function u D(R
d
) such that u(0) > 0 and u(x) 0, for all x R
d
.
Proof. Consider the function f C

(R) dened as:

f(x) =
_
0 x 0
exp(1/x) x > 0
Then, the function
u(x) = f(1 x
2
)
satises the assumptions. By translation and scaling, we show that for every r > 0, the function
x u
_
x x
0
r
_
is positive on R, strictly positive at x
0
and its support is the ball of radius r centered at x
0
.
The existence of such function u allows to prove a classical result.
Theorem 1.2 If f, g C
0
() and if the following identity holds
_

fudx =
_

gudx, u D() ,
then, f = g.
Proof. Let consider h = f g, then
_

hudx = 0 , u D() .
If h is a complex valued function, we will consider the real and imaginary parts separately. Hence, consider h is a
real valued function and that the previous equality holds for all u D(), u being a real valued function. If there
exists x
0
such that h(x
0
) = 0 then we select u such that u(x
0
) > 0 with support in a neighborhood of x
0
and such
that uh has constant sign. This obviously is in contradiction with the assumption, thus h 0 in .
Lemma 1.4 There exists an increasing function C

(R) such that

(x) =
_
0 x 0
1 x 1
1.1. Innitely smooth functions 7
Proof. Consider the function f C

(R) dened hereabove as:

f(x) =
_
0 x 0
exp(1/x) x > 0
In this case, Supp(f) = [0, [ and 0 f(x) 1, for all x R. We introduce the functions g(x) = f(x)f(1x) and
G(x) =
_
x
0
g(t) dt. We notice that 0 g(x) 1, for all x R and that Supp(g) [0, 1] and g 0. The function
=
G(x)
G(1)
C

(R) is an increasing function and is such that

(x) =
_
0 x 0
1 x 1

Proposition 1.2 Consider four real numbers a, b, c and d such that a < c < d < b. Then, there exists
D(R) such that:
(i) (x) = 1, for all x ]c, d[,
(ii) Supp() ]a, b[,
(iii) 0 (x) 1, for all x R.
Proof. Consider the function (x) =
_
x a
c a
_

_
b x
b d
_
, where is the function dened in the previous
lemma.
If K is a compact subset of R
d
and > 0, we denote
K

= K +B(0, ) =
_
xK
B(x, ) ,
where B(x, ) the ball of radius centered at x R
d
.
Proposition 1.3 Consider a compact set K R
d
. Then, for every > 0, there exists u D(K
2
) such
that:
_
u(x) = 1 x K

0 u(x) 1 x R
d
Proof. By compacity, there exists x
1
, . . . , x
p
K such that
K

p
_
j=1
B
_
x
j
,
4
3
_
.
For each j = 1, . . . , p there exists a function u
j
D(B(x
j
,
5
3
)) such that u
j
(x) 0 for all x R
d
and u
j
1 on
B(x
j
,
4
3
). Consider u(x) =

d
j=1
u
j
(x). Then, u(x) 1 for all x
p
_
j=1
B(x
j
, ). Moreover, given that
p
_
j=1
B
_
x
j
,
5
3
_
K
2
,
we conclude that u D(K
2
). Taking u = ( u(x)) where C

(R) is the function introduced in the previous

lemma, yields the result.
8 Chapter 1. Distributions on open sets of R
d
Corollary 1.3 Let K
1
, K
2
be two disjoined compact subsets of the open set R
d
. Then, there exists
a function u D() such that
u(x) =
_
1 x K
1
1 x K
2
and such that |u(x)| 1 for all x .
Proof. Consider U
1
and U
2
two open sets of such that
K
1
U
1
, K
2
U
2
, U
1
U
2
= .
From the previous proposition, we know that there exists u
1
, u
2
D() such that:
u
i
1 , in K
i
, u
i
D(U
i
) , 0 u
i
(x) 1 , i {1, 2} .
The function u dened as: u(x) = u
1
(x) u
2
(x), x satises the desired properties.
1.1.3 Partition of unity
Partitions of unity are useful because they often allow one to extend local constructions to the whole
space.
Proposition 1.4 Let K be a compact subset of R
d
and let consider an open cover (U
j
)
j=1,...,N
of K.
Then, there exists compacts sets (K
j
)
j=1,...,N
such that K
j
U
j
, for all j = 1, . . . , N and
K =
N
_
j=1
K
j
. (1.6)
Proof. For every x K, consider r
x
> 0 such that B(x, r
x
)

xUj
U
j
. Hence, we have K
_
xK
B(x, r
x
) and
thus there exists x
1
, . . . , x
M
K such that K
M
_
i=1
B(x
i
, r
xi
). We pose
K
j
= K
_
_
_
B(xi,rx
i
)Uj
B(x
i
, r
xi
)
_
_
.
Then by denition, K
j
is a compact set included in K such that K
j
U
j
. Let consider x K. There exists
i {1, . . . , M} such that x B(x
i
, r
xi
). Moreover, there exists j
0
{1, . . . , N} such that x
i
U
j0
, thus
B(x
i
, r
xi
) U
j0
. We conclude that x K
j0
.
Theorem 1.3 (Partition of unity) Consider a compact subset K of R
d
and open sets U
j
of R
d
. Sup-
pose we have K
N
_
j=1
U
j
, then there exists a collection (u
j
)
j=1,...,N
such that u
j
D(U
j
), 0 u
j
1 for
all j = 1, . . . , N and such that
N

j=1
u
j
= 1 in the neighborhood of K.
1.1. Innitely smooth functions 9
Proof. We know that there exists compact sets (K
j
)
j{1,...,N}
such that K
j
U
j
, for every j = 1, . . . , N and
such that K =
N
_
j=1
K
j
. Moreover, from the previous proposition, we deduce that for every j = 1, . . . , N, there
exists v
j
D(U
j
) such that v
j
(x) [0, 1], for all x R
d
and v
j
(x) = 1 if x K
j
. Consider the open set
V =
_
_
_
x
N
_
j=1
U
j
,
N

j=1
v
j
(x) > 0
_
_
_
.
We have then K V . Hence, there exists D(V ) such that (x) [0, 1] for x R
d
and 1 on an open set
W such that K W V . Considering the function
u
i
=
v
j
(1 ) +

N
k=1
v
k
,
we notice that u
i
D(U
j
) as the denominator is strictly positive on V and is equal to 1 outside V . Since 1 on
the set W, the relation implies that
N

j=1
u
i
1 on W.
Denition 1.5 Under the hypothesis of Theorem 1.3, the collection (u
j
)
j=1,...,N
is called a partition of
unity subordinate to the open cover (U
j
)
j=1,...,N
of K.
1.1.4 Lebesgue integration
We briey recall some important results about Lebesgue integration and L
p
spaces and we refer the
reader to Appendix D for more details and results.
If is an open subset of R
d
and p 1, we denote by L
p
() the space of p-power integrable functions
with values in R. The space L
p
() endowed with the norm
f
L
p
()
=
__

|f(x)|
p
dx
_1
p
, f L
p
() , (1.7)
is a Banach space. If p 1, we denote by L
p
loc
() the space of locally integrable functions f such that
f L
p
(K), for every compact K .
Lemma 1.5 If f L
p
loc
() then, there exists a largest open set V in such that f|
V
= 0 almost
everywhere in V .
Denition 1.6 Consider R
d
and f L
1
loc
(). We call essential support of f the closed set \V
where V is the largest open V such that f|
V
= 0 almost everywhere in V .
Theorem 1.4 (Lebesgue dominated convergence) Let (f
n
)
nN
be a sequence of functions of L
1
(),
with an open set of R
d
. Suppose that
(i) f
n
(x) f(x) almost everywhere on ,
(ii) there exists a function g L
1
() such that for every n, |f
n
(x)| g(x) almost everywhere in .
Then, f L
1
() and lim
n
f
n
f
L
1
()
= 0.
Theorem 1.5 (Lebesgue) Let be an open set of R
d
, f : R
p
R and k N. Suppose that
(i) the function f
x
: R dened by f
x
() = f(x, ) belongs to C
k
() for every xed x R
p
,
10 Chapter 1. Distributions on open sets of R
d
(ii) for all N
n
such that || k we have
sup

f
x
()| w

(x) ,
where w

L
1
(R
p
).
Then, the function g() =
_
R
p
f(x, ) dx is a function of C
k
() and for every R we have:

g() =
_
R
p

f(x, ) dx, N
n
|| k .
Consider
1
R
n
1
,
2
R
n
2
two open sets and a measurable function F :
1

2
C. We have
two classical results.
Theorem 1.6 (Tonelli) Suppose that
_

2
|F(x, y)| dy < for almost every x
1
and that
_

1
dx
_

2
|F(x, y)| dy < .
Then F L
1
(
1

2
).
Theorem 1.7 (Fubini) Suppose F L
1
(
1

2
). Then, we have F(x, y) L
1
(
2
) for almost every
x
1
and
_

2
F(x, y) dy L
1
(
1
). Similarly, we have F(x, y) L
1
(
1
) for almost every y
2
and
_

1
F(x, y) dx L
1
(
2
). Furthermore, we have:
_

1
dx
_

2
F(x, y) dy =
_

2
dy
_

1
F(x, y) dx =
_

2
F(x, y) dxdy .
To conclude this section, we give the following density result.
Theorem 1.8 (i) If p 1, then the space C
0
0
() is dense in L
p
().
(ii) If 1 p < , the space D() is dense in L
p
().
1.2 The concept of distribution
1.2.1 Main denitions
Let be an open subset of R
d
and let K denote a compact of . In this section, we call test function on
any function of D() and we denote by D
K
() the set of test functions with support in K. Furthermore,
we like to introduce the following notations: given (, ) N
d
N
d
, x R
d
, and u C

() :
||
def
=
d

j=1

j
, !
def
=
d

j=1

j
! , x

def
=
d

j=1
x

j
j
,

u
def
=
d

j=1

j
j
u.
1.2. The concept of distribution 11
Denition 1.7 We call distribution on any linear form T on D() such that the following continuity
property holds: for every compact set K , there exists an integer N and a constant C
K
such that:
|T, u| C
K
sup
||N

u
L
, u D
K
() (1.8)
and we denote by D

() the set of all distributions on .

If for every compact K , the previous inequality holds for the same integer N, then the order of the
distribution u is at most N.
Example 1.1 (i) Every function f L
1
loc
() denes a distribution T
f
D

() or order 0 by posing
T
f
, u =
_

f(x)u(x) dx, u D() .

(ii) Given a , we consider the linear form on D() dened as

a
, u = u(a) , u D() .
Hence, we have
|
a
, u| u
L

()
, u D() ,

a
is a distribution of order 0 in , called the Dirac mass at point a. However,
a
cannot be obtained
via a L
1
loc
() function. Indeed, suppose that there exists f L
1
loc
() such that

a
, u =
_

f(x)u(x) dx = u(a) , u D() . (1.9)

By denoting

= \{a}, we have

a
, u =
_

f(x)u(x) dx = 0 , u D(

) .
Hence, we can show that f = 0 almost everywhere in

and thus almost everywhere in . Therefore,
_

f(x)u(x) dx = 0 for every function u D(). This is in contradiction with he assumption (1.9)
when u(a) = 0.
The continuity property of a distribution can be characterized using sequences, as for the linear operators
in normed spaces. We introduce rst the notion of convergence in D().
Denition 1.8 Let consider an open set R
d
. The sequence (u
n
)
nN
of elements of D() converges
toward u D() if
1. there exists a compact set K in such that Supp(u
n
) K, for all n N.
2. for every N
n
, we have lim
n

(u
n
u)

= 0.
Denition 1.9 Let consider a sequence (T
n
)
nN
of elements in D

() and a distribution T on . The

sequence (T
n
)
nN
is said to converge toward T if and only if:
u D() , lim
n
T
n
, u = T, u .
Theorem 1.9 A linear form T : D() C is a distribution on if and only if, for any sequence
(u
n
)
nN
D() tending toward 0 in D(), we have:
lim
n
T, u
n
= 0 .
12 Chapter 1. Distributions on open sets of R
d
Proof. Suppose T D

() and consider (u
n
)
nN
D() tending toward 0 in D(). From the previous denition
of the convergence in D(), we know that there exists a compact subset K in such that Supp(u
n
) K for each
n N. Hence, there exist constants C
K
and N
K
such that
|T, u
n
| C
K

||N
K

u
n

, n N.
Since lim
n

u
n

= 0 for each given , we deduce the result for every sequence (u

n
)
nN
D() tending
toward 0 in D(). The reciprocal assertion is established by contradiction.
Suppose there exists a compact K
0
in such that for all N N and for every C > 0 we could nd u
N,C

D
K0
() verifying
|T, u
N,C
| > C

||N

u
N,C

.
Take u
N
= u
N,N
for every N N

. It is obvious that u
N
= 0, hence assume that the following equality holds
sup
||N

u
N

=
1
N
.
Hence, the two previous equalitites yield the result
|T, u
N
| > 1 , N N.
Since, for every N N, Supp(u
N
) K
0
we deduce
lim
N
u
N
= 0 , in D() ,
that is obviously in contradiction with the hypothesis.
We may be wondering what is the meaning of the integral
_

f(x)u(x) dx for arbitrary functions and

for every test function u. Obviously, the function f must be in L
1
(K) for every compact set K in . The
following theorem allows to consider functions in L
1
loc
() as distributions.
Theorem 1.10 Consider a test function u D
K
(). The linear map : L
1
loc
() D

(), f (f) :
u
_

f(x)u(x) dx is a linear injection. Furthermore, for any compact K in , we have

u D
K
() , |(f), u| f
L
1
(K)
u
L

()
.
Remark 1.1 We will assume now that any function f in L
1
loc
() is identical to the distribution
u
_

f(x)u(x) dx.
When considering that the distribution T is a function, this will mean that there exists a function f
L
1
loc
() such that
u D() , T, u =
_

f(x)u(x) dx.
The following proposition establishes that the Dirac mass is the limit of the approximations of identity.
Proposition 1.5 Consider a function in D(R
d
) of integral 1 and (
n
)
nN
a sequence of real numbers
tending toward 0. We pose

n
(x)
def
=
d
n

_
x

n
_
.
Then, the sequence (
n
)
nN
converges toward
0
in the distributional sense, where
0
is the linear form
dened by
0
: D(R
d
) C, u u(0).
1.2. The concept of distribution 13
Remark 1.2 This result has a physical meaning. Indeed, if the functions
n
are considered as mass
densities, the limit (in a certain sense) must be seen as a ponctual mass associated with the origin.
Denition 1.10 We call principal value of the function 1/x and we denote it pv
1
x
the distribution
dened by:
pv
1
x
, u =
1
2
_

u(x) u(x)
x
dx, u D(R) .
Notice that this formula denes a distribution since we have, for every test function u D
[R,R]
,

pv
1
x
, u

Ru

L
.
1.2.2 Operations on distributions
We dene now several usual operations on distributions that are already familiar for classical smooth
functions, for example test functions.
Denition 1.11 (Restriction) Suppose and are two open subsets in R
d
such that and
consider a distribution T on . We dene the restriction of T to the open set , denoted by T
|
, as
u D() , T
|
, u
def
= T, u .
Furthermore, if f L
1
loc
() we have:
u D() ,
_

f
|
(x)u(x) dx =
_

f
|
(x)u(x) dx.
This denition coincide with the notion of restriction for functions.
Remark 1.3 The restriction of a distribution to a set is only dened for an open set.
If T
1
and T
2
are distributions of order m on R
d
, it is obvious that T
1
+ T
2
and aT
1
are distributions of
the same order for all a R. However, the product T
1
T
2
of two distributions is not a distribution. For
example, if we were to dene T
1
T
2
, u = T
1
, uT
2
, u, this is not linear in u.
1.2.3 Dierentiation of distributions
One of the strongest advantage of the distribution theory is that the dierentiation operation is always
dened and is continuous. Indeed, consider a function f C
1
(R
d
) and u D(R
d
), then:
_
f
x
i
, u
_
=
_
R
d
f
x
i
(x)u(x) dx,
=
_
R
d
u
x
i
(x)f(x) dx =
_
f,
u
x
i
_
.
This result is still valid if we set f to be a distribution. More precisely,
Proposition 1.6 Let T D

() be a distribution on an open set R

d
. The linear form T
(j)
on D()
dened by:
T
(j)
, u
def
=
_
T,
u
x
j
_
= T,
x
j
u ,
denes a distribution on . Furthermore, if (T
n
)
nN
is a sequence in D

() converging toward T, then

the sequence (T
(j)
n
)
nN
converges toward T
(j)
.
14 Chapter 1. Distributions on open sets of R
d
Proof. Since T is a distribution, for every compact K in , there exists a constant C and an integer N such
that
v D
K
, |T, v| C sup
||N

v
L
.
For every u D
K
, we apply this to v =
xj
u D
K
. Hence, we have
u D
K
, |T
(j)
, u| = |T,
xj
u| C sup
||N+1

u
L
.
Thus, T
(j)
is a distribution on . Moreover, for every function u D() we have:
lim
n
T
(j)
n
, u = lim
n
T
n
,
xj
u = T,
xj
u = T
(j)
, u .
the results follows.
Denition 1.12 Suppose T D

(). Then, the distribution T

(j)
is called the partial derivative of T
with respect to the variable x
j
and is denoted
x
j
T and is such that:

x
j
T, u = T,
x
j
u , u D() . (1.10)
Notice that if f is a dierentiable function, the derivative of the distribution associated with f coincide
with the usual derivative of f.
Example 1.2 (i) The Heaviside step function H is the characteristic function of R
+
. We have
x
H =

0
in D

(R). Indeed, for any test function u D(R), we have:

x
H, u =
_
dH
dx
, u
_
= H, u

=
_
+

(x)H(x) dx
=
_
+
0
u

(x) dx = u(0) since u(+) = 0

=
0
, u .
(1.11)
Hence, the derivative of H in the sens of distributions is the Dirac mass dened hereabove.
(ii) Since the function f(x) = log |x| is in the space L
1
loc
(R), it denes an element of D

(R). Indeed,
the derivative of f in the distributional sense is the distribution pv
1
x
introduced previously:
df
dx
= pv
1
x
.
According to the denition of the derivative in D

(R), we have for all u D(R):

_
df
dx
, u
_
=
_
R
log(|x|)u

(x) dx.
We observe that:
_
|x|>
log(|x|)u

(x) dx = [u() u()] log

_
|x|>
u

(x) dx,
and thus, we deduce that
_
R
log(|x|)u

(x) dx = lim
n
_
|x|>
log(|x|)u

(x) dx = pv
1
x
, u .
1.2. The concept of distribution 15
The next results establishes a relation between the derivative and the primitive, in the distributional
sense.
Theorem 1.11 Consider a distribution T on an open interval I R. If its derivative, in the distribu-
tional sense, T

is a function of L
1
loc
(I), then T is a continuous function and we have, for all a I:
T(x) =
_
x
a
T

(x)dx +C .
Lemma 1.6 Suppose I is an open interval of R. Then,
1. the distributions on I for which the identity T

= 0 holds, are the constant functions.

2. for any T
2
D

(I), there exists T

1
D

(I) such that T

1
= T
2
.
3. for a I and f L
1
loc
(I), we have (in the distributional sense):
d
dx
_
x
a
f(y)dy = f(x) .
Proof. Let consider D(I), such that
_
I
(x) dx = 1, and u D(I). Then, the function
(x) = u(x)
__
I
u(x) dx
_
(x) D(I) and
_
I
(x) dx = 0 .
This implies the existence of a unique function v D(I) such that v

= . Hence, there exists a unique function

v D(I) such that
v

= u
__
I
u(x) dx
_
. (1.12)
Now, let consider T D

(I) such that T

= 0. We have
T, u =
__
I
u(x) dx
_
T, +T, v

.
The term T, v

= T

, v is equal to zero and we obtain by denoting C the constant term T, :

T, u = C
_
I
u(x) dx.
Thus, T is equal to a constant C.
To nd a primitive T
1
of T
2
, we pose
T
1
, u = T
2
, v ,
where v is the unique function of D(I) associated with u via the relation (1.12). It is easy to show the linearity
and continuity of T
1
and thus we have
T
1
, u

= T
2
, u , u D(I) ,
and thus we have proved that T

1
= T
2
.
Lemma 1.7 Consider T D

(R
d
) and suppose that
x
j
T = 0 for all i = 1, . . . , d. Then, T is a constant
(function).
16 Chapter 1. Distributions on open sets of R
d
1.2.4 Multiplication by a C

function
Proposition 1.7 Let consider f C

() and T D

(). Then, for all u D(), the linear form on

D() dened by u T, fu is a distribution on . The order of this distribution on every compact K
in in lesser than or equal to the order of T on K.
Denition 1.13 The product of the distribution T D

() by the function f C

() is the distribution
dened by:
fT, u = T, fu , u D() .
Example 1.3 (i) For f C

() and a , we have f
a
= f(a)
a
. Indeed, we can observe that
f
a
, u =
a
, fu = f(a)
a
, u , u D() .
In particular, x
0
= 0.
(ii) We can nd all solutions T D

() of the equation xT = 0. Let consider D(R) such that

(0) = 1. For every function u D(R), the function u u(0) vanishes at the origin, hence there
exists a function v C

(R) such that

u = u(0) +xv .
Since u and are functions with compact support, the relation means that v D(R). Thus, we
have
T, u = u(0)T, +T, xv .
By assumption, we have T, xv = xT, v = 0. Denoting C the constant T, , we obtain that
T, u = Cu(0), hence T = C
0
.
Proposition 1.8 (Leibniz formula) Consider f C

() and T D

(). Then,

x
i
(fT) =
f
x
i
T +f
x
i
T , i {1, . . . , n} .