We study a minimisation problem in L p and L ∞ for certain cost functionals, where the class of admissible mappings is constrained by the Navier–Stokes equations. Problems of this type are motivated by variational data assimilation for atmospheric flows arising in weather forecasting. Herein we establish the existence of PDE-constrained minimisers for all p, and also that L p minimisers converge to L ∞ minimisers as p → ∞. We further show that L p minimisers solve an Euler–Lagrange system. Finally, all special L ∞ minimisers constructed via approximation by L p minimisers are shown to solve a divergence PDE system involving measure coefficients, which is a divergence-form counterpart of the corresponding non-divergence Aronsson–Euler system.

We study minimisation problems in L ∞ {L^{\infty}} for general quasiconvex first order functionals, where the class of admissible mappings is constrained by the sublevel sets of another supremal functional and by the zero set of a nonlinear operator. Examples of admissible operators include those expressing pointwise, unilateral, integral isoperimetric, elliptic quasilinear differential, Jacobian and null Lagrangian constraints. Via the method of L p {L^{p}} approximations as p → ∞ {p\to\infty} , we illustrate the existence of a special L ∞ {L^{\infty}} minimiser which solves a divergence PDE system involving certain auxiliary measures as coefficients. This system can be seen as a divergence form counterpart of the Aronsson PDE system which is associated with the constrained L ∞ {L^{\infty}} variational problem.