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this question may be shameful, but nevertheless I can't help myself.

Let $U \subset \mathbb R^n$ be arbitrary, in particular not the whole of the space itself. I wonder about the dual of the space $W^{1,p}(U)$, for $p < \infty$.

For $U = \mathbb R^n$, we have $(W^{1,p})' = (W^{1,p'})$ with $p' = \frac{p}{p-1}$. How about different $U$?

For example, in case $U = B_1(0)$ being the closed $1$-Ball, it seems the dual is not a function space. Just recall that the trace is well-defined, linear and continuous on $W^{1,p}(U)$ and, with $S_1$ the boundary of $B_1(0)$ and $w \in L^p(S_1)$, we are given are continuous linear functional by

$ W^{1,p}(B_1(0)) \longrightarrow \mathbb C \, , f \mapsto \int_{S_1} w \cdot tr f dx $.

In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if the above example were somehow prototypical, but I have no clue how to proceed from this point. I regard this relevant, as these spaces are ubiquitous in analysis.

Thank you!

2 Answers 2