TITLE: How to prove the second Korn inequality?
QUESTION [5 upvotes]: $\textbf{Theorem}.1$ (The first Korn inequality) Suppose that $ \Omega $ is a bounded domain in $ \mathbb{R}^d $ with Lipschitz boundary. Then\
\begin{eqnarray}
\sqrt{2}\left\|\triangledown u\right\|_{L^2(\Omega)}\leq \left\|\triangledown u+(\triangledown u)^T\right\|_{L^2(\Omega)}
\end{eqnarray}
for any $ u\in H_{0}^{1}(\Omega;\mathbb{R}^d) $, where $ (\triangledown u)^T $ denotes the transpose of $ \triangledown u $.


$\textbf{Theorem}.2$ (The second Korn inequality) Suppose that $ \Omega $ is a bounded domain in $ \mathbb{R}^d $ with Lipschitz boundary. If $ u\in H^{1}(\Omega,\mathbb{R}^d) $ is a function with the property that $ u\perp R $ in $ H^{1}(\Omega;\mathbb{R}^d) $, then
\begin{eqnarray}
\int_{\Omega}|\triangledown u|^2dx\leq C\int_{\Omega}|\triangledown u+(\triangledown u)^T|^2dx
\end{eqnarray}
where $ R=\left\{\phi=Bx+b:B\in\mathbb{R}^{d\times d} \text{ is skew-symmetric and }b\in\mathbb{R}^d\right\} $ and $ C $ is a constant.

I recently see the two theorems in a book about elliptic equations. I tried to get the estimate for the second inequality by direct computation which works in the proof of the first Korn inequality, but for this inequality, I cannot combine the condition $ u\perp R $ with the final results. Can you give me some hints or references?

REPLY [4 votes]: You can find a full proof (to my knowledge the simpler one currently known) in the paper [1] and in the book [2], chapter I, §2.1 pp. 14-21. The original proof of Arthur Korn is so long and involved that K.O. Friedrichs, who gave a much simpler yet sophisticated proof, had doubts on his validity: starting from the work of Friedrichs, several authors gave their (in general quite complex) proofs, until Olga Oleĭnik gave a much shorter and simpler one (despite being still not elementary).
References
[1] Vladimir Alexandrovitch Kondratiev, Olga Arsenievna Oleĭnik,
"On Korn’s inequalities" (English), Comptes Rendus de l’Académie des Sciences, Série I, 308, No. 16, pp. 483-487 (1989), MR0995908, Zbl 0698.35067.
[2] Olga Arsenievna Oleĭnik, Alexei Stanislavovich Shamaev, Grigorii Andronikovich Yosifian, Mathematical problems in elasticity and homogenization. (English) Studies in Mathematics and its Applications. 26. Amsterdam-London-New York-Tokyo: North- Holland, pp. xiii+398 (1992), ISBN: 0-444-88441-6, MR1195131, Zbl 0768.73003.