We study the second-order boundary value problem \begin{equation*} \begin{cases} \, -u''=a_{λ,μ}(t) \, u^{2}(1-u), & t\in(0,1), \\ \, u'(0)=0, \quad u'(1)=0, \end{cases} \end{equation*} where $a_{λ,μ}$ is a step-wise indefinite weight function, precisely $a_{λ,μ}\equivλ$ in $[0,σ]\cup[1-σ,1]$ and $a_{λ,μ}\equiv-μ$ in $(σ,1-σ)$, for some $σ\in\left(0,\frac{1}{2}\right)$, with $λ$ and $μ$ positive real parameters. We investigate the topological structure of the set of positive solutions which lie in $(0,1)$ as $λ$ and $μ$ vary. Depending on $λ$ and based on a phase-plane analysis and on time-mapping estimates, our findings lead to three different (from the topological point of view) global bifurcation diagrams of the solutions in terms of the parameter $μ$. Finally, for the first time in the literature, a qualitative bifurcation diagram concerning the number of solutions in the $(λ,μ)$-plane is depicted. The analyzed Neumann problem has an application in the analysis of stationary solutions to reaction-diffusion equations in population genetics driven by migration and selection.
We obtain a description of the Fučik spectrum associated to the one-dimensional asymmetric problem with indefinite weights $Lu = am(t)u^+ - bn(t)u^-$ in $]T_1, T_2[$, $u'(T_1) = 0 = u'(T_2)$, where $L$ is a Sturm-Liouville operator. Our approach is based on the shooting method.
We prove the existence of a pair of positive radial solutions for the Neumann boundary value problem \begin{equation*} \begin{cases} \, \mathrm{div}\,\Biggl{(} \dfrac{\nabla u}{\sqrt{1- | \nabla u |^{2}}}\Biggr{)} + λa(|x|)u^p = 0, & \text{in $B$,} \\ \, \partial_νu=0, & \text{on $\partial B$,} \end{cases} \end{equation*} where $B$ is a ball centered at the origin, $a(|x|)$ is a radial sign-changing function with $\int_B a(|x|)\,\mathrm{d}x < 0$, $p>1$ and $λ> 0$ is a large parameter. The proof is based on the Leray-Schauder degree theory and extends to a larger class of nonlinearities.
We study the positive principal eigenvalue of a weighted problem associated with the Neumann spectral fractional Laplacian. This analysis is related to the investigation of the survival threshold in population dynamics. Our main result concerns the optimization of such threshold with respect to the fractional order $s\in(0,1]$, the case $s=1$ corresponding to the standard Neumann Laplacian: when the habitat is not too fragmented, the principal positive eigenvalue can not have local minima for $0<s<1$. As a consequence, the best strategy for survival is either following the diffusion with $s=1$…
We investigate the problem $$-Δu = λb(x)|u|^{q-2}u +a(x)|u|^{p-2}u \mbox{ in } Ω, \quad \frac{\partial u}{\partial \mathbf{n}} = 0 \mbox{ on } \partial Ω, \leqno{(P_λ)} $$ where $Ω$ is a bounded smooth domain in $\mathbb{R}^N$ ($N \geq2$), $1<q<2<p$, $λ\in \mathbb{R}$, and $a,b \in C^α(\overlineΩ)$ with $0<α<1$. Under some indefinite type conditions on $a$ and $b$ we prove the existence of two nontrivial non-negative solutions for $|λ|$ small. We characterize then the asymptotic profiles of these solutions as $λ\to 0$, which implies in some cases the positivity and ordering of these solutions.…
The aim of this paper is analyzing existence, multiplicity, and regularity issues for the positive solutions of a Neumann boundary value problem of superlinear indefinite type related to the mean curvature operator with a sublinear potential at infinity.
We study the minimization of the positive principal eigenvalue associated to a weighted Neumann problem settled in a bounded smooth domain $Ω\subset \mathbb{R}^{N}$, within a suitable class of sign-changing weights. Denoting with $u$ the optimal eigenfunction and with $D$ its super-level set associated to the optimal weight, we perform the analysis of the singular limit of the optimal eigenvalue as the measure of $D $ tends to zero. We show that, when the measure of $D$ is sufficiently small, $u $ has a unique local maximum point lying on the boundary of $Ω$ and $D$ is connected. Furthermore, …
Let $Ω\subset\mathbb{R}^{N}$ ($N\geq1$) be a bounded and smooth domain and $a:Ω\rightarrow\mathbb{R}$ be a sign-changing weight satisfying $\int_Ωa<0$. We prove the existence of a positive solution $u_{q}$ for the problem $(P_{a,q})$: $-Δu=a(x)u^{q}$ in $Ω$, $\frac{\partial u}{\partialν}=0$ on $\partialΩ$, if $q_{0}<q<1$, for some $q_{0}=q_{0}(a)>0$. In doing so, we improve the existence result previously established in [16]. In addition, we provide the asymptotic behavior of $u_{q}$ as $q\rightarrow1^{-}$. When $Ω$ is a ball and $a$ is radial, we give some explicit conditions on $q$ and $a$ e…
Inhomogeneous Kirchhoff type equations with indefinite data are considered. Some necessary and sufficient conditions for the existence of positive solutions of the problem under consideration are presented.
We establish a positivity property for a class of semilinear elliptic problems involving indefinite sublinear nonlinearities. Namely, we show that any nontrivial nonnegative solution is positive for a class of problems the strong maximum principle does not apply to. Our approach is based on a continuity argument combined with variational techniques, the sub and supersolutions method and some a priori bounds. Both Dirichlet and Neumann homogeneous boundary conditions are considered. As a byproduct, we deduce some existence and uniqueness results. Finally, as an application, we derive some posit…
We prove the existence of a loop type component of non-negative solutions for an indefinite elliptic equation with homogeneous Neumann boundary conditions. This result complements our previous results obtained in [12], where the existence of another loop type component was established in a different situation. Our proof combines local and global bifurcation theory, rescaling and regularizing arguments, a priori bounds, and Whyburn's topological method. A further investigation of the loop type component established in [12] is also provided.
We investigate positive steady states of an indefinite superlinear reaction-diffusion equation arising from population dynamics, coupled with a nonlinear boundary condition. Both the equation and the boundary condition depend upon a positive parameter $λ$, which is inversely proportional to the diffusion rate. We establish several multiplicity results when the diffusion rate is large and analyze the asymptotic profiles and the stability properties of these steady states as the diffusion rate grows to infinity. In particular, our results show that in some cases bifurcation from zero and from in…
We consider a nonlinear elliptic equation driven by the Robin $p$-Laplacian plus an indefinite potential. In the reaction we have the competing effects of a strictly $(p-1)$-sublinear parametric term and of a $(p-1)$-linear and nonuniformly nonresonant term. We study the set of positive solutions as the parameter $λ>0$ varies. We prove a bifurcation-type result for large values of the positive parameter $λ$. Also, we show that for all admissible $λ>0$, the problem has a smallest positive solution $\overline{u}_λ$ and we study the monotonicity and continuity properties of the map $λ\mapsto\over…
We study perturbations of the eigenvalue problem for the negative Laplacian plus an indefinite and unbounded potential and Robin boundary condition. First we consider the case of a sublinear perturbation and then of a superlinear perturbation. For the first case we show that for $λ<\widehatλ_{1}$ ($\widehatλ_{1}$ being the principal eigenvalue) there is one positive solution which is unique under additional conditions on the perturbation term. For $λ\geq\widehatλ_{1}$ there are no positive solutions. In the superlinear case, for $λ<\widehatλ_{1}$ we have at least two positive solutions and for…
We consider a nonlinear Dirichlet problem driven by a variable exponent $p$-Laplacian plus an indefinite potential term. The reaction has the competing effects of a parametric concave (sublinear) term and of a convex (superlinear) perturbation (an anisotropic concave-convex problem). We prove a bifurcation-type theorem describing the changes in the set of positive solutions as the positive parameter $λ$ varies. Also, we prove the existence of minimal positive solutions.
We investigate the existence of a curve $q\mapsto u_{q}$, with $q\in(0,1)$, of positive solutions for the problem $(P_{a,q})$: $-Δu=a(x)u^{q}$ in $Ω$, $u=0$ on $\partialΩ$, where $Ω$ is a bounded and smooth domain of $\mathbb{R}^{N}$ and $a:Ω\rightarrow\mathbb{R}$ is a sign-changing function (in which case the strong maximum principle does not hold). In addition, we analyze the asymptotic behavior of $u_{q}$ as $q\rightarrow0^{+}$ and $q\rightarrow1^{-}$. We also show that in some cases $u_{q}$ is the ground state solution of $(P_{a,q})$. As a byproduct, we obtain existence results for a singu…
In this paper, we study the existence and multiplicity results of nontrivial positive solutions to the following quasilinear elliptic equation on $\RN$, when $N\geq2$, \begin{equation} \Lp u=λ\hspace{0.2mm}K(x)u^{r-1}-V(x)u^{q-1}.\nonumber \end{equation} Here, $K(x),V(x)>0$ are suitable potentials, $1<p<r<q<\infty$, and $λ>0$ is a parameter. To study this problem, some compact embedding results regarding $\MVR\hookrightarrow\LKR$ are proved that unify and extend some recent results of the author \cite{Ha1,Ha2,Ha3}.
Let $Ω\subset\mathbb{R}^{N}$, $N\geq1$, be a smooth bounded domain, and let $m:Ω\rightarrow\mathbb{R}$ be a possibly sign-changing function. We investigate the existence of positive solutions for the semipositone problem $-Δu=λm(x)(f(u)-k)$ in $Ω$, $u=0$ on $\partialΩ$, where $λ,k>0$ and $f$ is either sublinear at infinity with $f(0)=0$, or $f$ has a singularity at $0$. We prove the existence of a positive solution for certain ranges of $λ$ provided that the negative part of $m$ is suitably small. Our main tool is the sub-supersolutions method, combined with some rescaling properties.
Our purpose is to find positive solutions $u \in D^{1,2}(\rz^N)$ of the semilinear elliptic problem $-\laplace u - λV(x) u = h(x) u^{p-1}$ for $2<p$. The functions $V$ and $h$ may have an indefinite sign and the linearized operator need not to have a first (principal) eigenvalue, e.g. we allow $V\equiv 1$. We give precise existence and nonexistence criteria, which depend on $λ$ and on the growth of $h^{-}$ and $h^{+}/V^+$. Existence theorems are obtained by constrained minimization. The mountain pass theorem leads to a second solution.
We provide new results on the existence, non-existence and multiplicity of non-negative radial solutions for semilinear elliptic systems with Neumann boundary conditions on an annulus. Our approach is topological and relies on the classical fixed point index. We present an example to illustrate our theory.
In this paper we prove a Lyapunov type inequality for quasilinear problems with indefinite weights. We show that the first eigenvalue is bounded below in terms of the integral of the weight, instead of the integral of its positive part. We apply this inequality to some eigenvalue homogenization problems with indefinite weights.
In this work we study the homogenization problem for nonlinear elliptic equations involving $p-$Laplacian type operators with sign changing weights. We study the asymptotic behavior of variational eigenvalues, which consist on a double sequence of eigenvalues. We show that the $k-$th positive eigenvalue goes to infinity when the average of the weight is nonpositive, and converge to the $k-$th variational eigenvalue of the limit problem when the average is positive for any $k\ge 1$.
We consider a nonlinear Dirichlet problem driven by a nonhomogeneous differential operator plus an indefinite potential. In the reaction we have the competing effects of a singular term and of concave and convex nonlinearities. In this paper the concave term is parametric. We prove a bifurcation-type theorem describing the changes in the set of positive solutions as the positive parameter $λ$ varies. This work continues our research published in arXiv:2004.12583, where $ξ\equiv 0 $ and in the reaction the parametric term is the singular one.
We consider a parametric semilinear Robin problem driven by the Laplacian plus an indefinite potential. The reaction term involves competing nonlinearities. More precisely, it is the sum of a parametric sublinear (concave) term and a superlinear (convex) term. The superlinearity is not expressed via the Ambrosetti-Rabinowitz condition. Instead, a more general hypothesis is used. We prove a bifurcation-type theorem describing the set of positive solutions as the parameter $λ> 0$ varies. We also show the existence of a minimal positive solution $\tilde{u}_λ$ and determine the monotonicity and co…
In this work we obtain a Liouville theorem for positive, bounded solutions of the equation $$ (-Δ)^s u= h(x_N)f(u) \quad \hbox{in }\mathbb{R}^{N} $$ where $(-Δ)^s$ stands for the fractional Laplacian with $s\in (0,1)$, and the functions $h$ and $f$ are nondecreasing. The main feature is that the function $h$ changes sign in $\mathbb{R}$, therefore the problem is sometimes termed as indefinite. As an application we obtain a priori bounds for positive solutions of some boundary value problems, which give existence of such solutions by means of bifurcation methods.
Spectral asymptotics of linear periodic elliptic operators with indefinite (sign-changing) density function is investigated in perforated domains with the two-scale convergence method. The limiting behavior of positive and negative eigencouples depends crucially on whether the average of the weight over the solid part is positive, negative or equal to zero. We prove concise homogenization results in all three cases.
This paper analyzes the structure of the set of positive solutions of a class of one-dimensional superlinear indefinite bvp's. It is a paradigm of how mathematical analysis aids the numerical study of a problem, whereas simultaneously its numerical study confirms and illuminates the analysis. On the analytical side, we establish the fast decay of the positive solutions as $λ\downarrow -\infty$ in the region where $a(x)<0$ (see (1.1)), as well as the decay of the solutions of the parabolic counterpart of the model (see (1.2)) as $λ\downarrow-\infty$ on any subinterval of $[0,1]$ where $u_0=0$, …
We establish the multiplicity of positive solutions to a quasilinear Neumann problem in expanding balls and hemispheres with critical exponent in the boundary condition.
Let $1<q<p$ and $a\in C(\overlineΩ)$ be sign-changing, where $Ω$ is a bounded and smooth domain of $\mathbb{R}^{N}$. We show that the functional \[ I_{q}(u):=\int_Ω\left( \frac{1}{p}|\nabla u|^{p}-\frac{1}{q}a(x)|u|^{q}\right) , \] has exactly one nonnegative minimizer $U_{q}$ (in $W_{0}^{1,p}(Ω)$ or $W^{1,p}(Ω)$). In addition, we prove that $U_{q}$ is the only possible \textit{positive} solution of the associated Euler-Lagrange equation, which shows that this equation has at most one positive solution. Furthermore, we show that if $q$ is close enough to $p$ then $U_{q}$ is positive, which als…
Our purpose is to find positive solutions $u \in D^{1,2}(\rz^N)$ of the semilinear elliptic problem $-\laplace u = h(x) u^{p-1}$ for $2<p$. The function $h$ may have an indefinite sign. Key ingredients are a $h$-dependent concentration-compactness Lemma and a characterization of compact embeddings of $D^{1,2}(\rz^N)$ into weighted Lebesgue spaces.
The asymptotic behavior of second order self-adjoint elliptic Steklov eigenvalue problems with periodic rapidly oscillating coefficients and with indefinite (sign-changing) density function is investigated in periodically perforated domains. We prove that the spectrum of this problem is discrete and consists of two sequences, one tending to -{\infty} and another to +{\infty}. The limiting behavior of positive and negative eigencouples depends crucially on whether the average of the weight over the surface of the reference hole is positive, negative or equal to zero. By means of the two-scale c…
We consider a nonlinear Neumann problem driven by the $p$-Laplacian. In the reaction term we have the competing effects of a singular and a convection term. Using a topological approach based on the Leray-Schauder alternative principle together with suitable truncation and comparison techniques, we show that the problem has positive smooth solutions.
In this paper, we consider the indefinite scalar curvature problem on $R^n$. We propose new conditions on the prescribing scalar curvature function such that the scalar curvature problem on $R^n$ (similarly, on $S^n$) has at least one solution. The key observation in our proof is that we use the bifurcation method to get a large solution and then after establishing the Harnack inequality for solutions near the critical points of the prescribed scalar curvature and taking limit, we find the nontrivial positive solution to the indefinite scalar curvature problem.
We analyze existence, multiplicity and oscillatory behavior of positive radial solutions to a class of quasilinear equations governed by the Lorentz-Minkowski mean curvature operator. The equation is set in a ball or an annulus of $\mathbb R^N$, is subject to homogeneous Neumann boundary conditions, and involves a nonlinear term on which we do not impose any growth condition at infinity. The main tool that we use is the shooting method for ODEs.
We study the existence and multiplicity of positive solutions for a family of fractional Kirchhoff equations with critical nonlinearity of the form \begin{equation*} M\left(\int_Ω|(-Δ)^{\fracα{2}}u|^2dx\right)(-Δ)^α u= λf(x)|u|^{q-2}u+|u|^{2^*_α-2}u\;\; \text{in}\; Ω,\;u=0\;\textrm{in}\;\mathbb R^n\setminus Ω, \end{equation*} where $Ω\subset \mathbb R^n$ is a smooth bounded domain, $ M(t)=a+\varepsilon t, \; a, \; \varepsilon>0,\; 0<α<1, \; 2α<n<4α$ and $ \; 1<q<2$. Here $2^*_α={2n}/{(n-2α)}$ is the fractional critical Sobolev exponent, $λ$ is a positive parameter and the coefficient $f(x)$ is…
We give new estimates on the lower bounds for the first closed or Neumann eigenvalue for a compact manifold with positive Ricci curvature in terms of the diameter and the lower bound of Ricci curvature. The results improve the previous estimates.
In this paper, we are interested in the analysis of a well-known free boundary/shape optimization problem motivated by some issues arising in population dynamics. The question is to determine optimal spatial arrangements of favorable and unfavorable regions for a species to survive. The mathematical formulation of the model leads to an indefinite weight linear eigenvalueproblem in a fixed box $Ω$ and we consider the general case of Robin boundary conditions on $\partialΩ$. It is well known that it suffices to consider {\it bang-bang} weights taking two values of different signs, that can be pa…
In this paper, we study the following semilinear Schrödinger equation with periodic coefficient: $$-\triangle u +V(x)u=f(x,u), u\in H^{1}(\mathbb{R}^{N}).$$ The functional corresponding to this equation possesses strongly indefinite structure. The nonlinear term $f(x,t)$ satisfies some superlinear growth conditions and need not be odd or increasing strictly in $t$. Using a new variational reduction method and a generalized Morse theory, we proved that this equation has infinitely many geometrically different solutions. Furthermore, if the solutions of this equation under some energy level are …
We consider the problem $$ (P_λ)\quad -Δ_{p}u=λu^{p-1}+a(x)u^{q-1},\quad u\geq0\quad\mbox{ in }Ω$$ under Dirichlet or Neumann boundary conditions. Here $Ω$ is a smooth bounded domain of $\mathbb{R}^{N}$ ($N\geq1$), $λ\in\mathbb{R}$, $1<q<p$, and $a\in C(\overlineΩ)$ changes sign. These conditions enable the existence of dead core solutions for this problem, which may admit multiple nontrivial solutions. We show that for $λ<0$ the functional \[ I_λ(u):=\int_Ω\left( \frac{1}{p}|\nabla u|^{p}-\frac{λ}{p}|u|^{p}-\frac{1}{q}a(x)|u|^{q}\right) , \] defined in $X=W_{0}^{1,p}(Ω)$ or $X=W^{1,p}(Ω)$, ha…
This paper deals with existence and multiplicity of positive solutions for a quasilinear problem with Neumann boundary conditions, set in a ball. The problem admits at least one constant non-zero solution and it involves a nonlinearity that can be supercritical in the sense of Sobolev embeddings. The main tools used are variational techniques and the shooting method for ODE's. These results are contained in [6,3].
We are concerned with the multiplicity of positive solutions for the singular superlinear and subcritical Schrödinger equation $$ \begin{array}{c} -Δu +V(x)u=λa(x)u^{-γ}+b(x)u^{p}~\mbox{in}~ \mathbb{R}^{N}, \end{array} $$ beyond the Nehari extremal value, as defined in Il'yasov [Topol. Methods Nonlinear Anal., 2017], when the potential $b \in L^{\infty}(\mathbb{R}^{N})$ may change its sign, $0<a\in L^{\frac{2}{1+γ}}(\mathbb{R}^{N})$, $V$ is a positive continuous function, $N\geq 3$ and $λ>0$ is a real parameter. The main difficulties come from the non-differentiability of the energy functional…
We study fractional parabolic equations with indefinite nonlinearities $$ \frac{\partial u} {\partial t}(x,t) +(-Δ)^s u(x,t)= x_1 u^p(x, t),\,\, (x, t) \in \mathbb{R}^n \times \mathbb{R}, $$ where $0<s<1$ and $1<p<\infty$. We first prove that all positive bounded solutions are monotone increasing along the $x_1$ direction. Based on this we derive a contradiction and hence obtain non-existence of solutions. These monotonicity and nonexistence results are crucial tools in a priori estimates and complete blow-up for fractional parabolic equations in bounded domains. To this end, we introduce seve…
In this paper, we study the following Kirchhoff type problem:% $$ \left\{\aligned&-\bigg(α\int_{\bbr^3}|\nabla u|^2dx+1\bigg)Δu+(λa(x)+a_0)u=|u|^{p-2}u&\text{ in }\bbr^3,\\% &u\in\h,\endaligned\right.\eqno{(\mathcal{P}_{α,λ})}% $$ where $4<p<6$, $α$ and $λ$ are two positive parameters, $a_0\in\bbr$ is a (possibly negative) constant and $a(x)\geq0$ is the potential well. By the variational method, we investigate the existence of nontrivial solutions to $(\mathcal{P}_{α,λ})$. To our best knowledge, it is the first time that the nontrivial solution of the Kirchhoff type problem is found in the in…
We construct multibump nodal solutions of the elliptic equation $$ -Δu=a^+[λu+ f(\, \cdot\,, u)]-μa^- g(\, \cdot\,, u) $$ in $H^1_0(Ω)$, when $μ$ is large, under appropriate assumptions, for $f$ superlinear and subcritical and such that the eigenvalues of the associated linearized operator on $H^1_0(\{x\inΩ:\: a(x)>0\})$ at zero, $u\longmapsto u-λ(-Δ)^{-1}(a^+ u)$, are positive. The solutions are of least energy in some Nehari-type set defined by imposing suitable conditions on orthogonal components of functions in $H^1_0(Ω)$.
Let $Ω$ be a smooth bounded domain in $\mathbb{R}^{N}$, $N\geq1$, let $K$, $M$ be two nonnegative functions and let $α,γ>0$. We study existence and nonexistence of positive solutions for singular problems of the form $-Δu=K\left( x\right) u^{-α}-λM\left( x\right) u^{-γ}$ in $Ω$, $u=0$ on $\partialΩ$, where $λ>0$ is a real parameter. We mention that as a particular case our results apply to problems of the form $-Δu=m\left( x\right) u^{-γ}$ in $Ω$, $u=0$ on $\partialΩ$, where $m$ is allowed to change sign in $Ω$.
In this paper we study the following class of nonlocal {problems} involving Caffarelli-Kohn-Nirenberg type critical growth \begin{align*} L(u)&-λh(x)|x|^{-2(1+a)}u=μf(x)|u|^{q-2}u+|x|^{-pb}|u|^{p-2}u\;\; \text{in } \mathbb R^N, \end{align*} where $h(x)\geq 0$, $f(x)$ is a continuous function which may change sign, $λ, μ$ are positive real parameters and $1<q<2$, $4< p=2N/[N+2(b-a)-2]$, $0\leq a<b<a+1<N/2$, $N\geq 3$. Here $$ L(u)=-M\left(\int_{\mathbb R^N} |x|^{-2a}|\nabla u|^2dx\right)\mathrm {div}(|x|^{-2a}\nabla u) $$ and the function $M:\mathbb R^+\cup \{0\} \to\mathbb R^+$ is exactly as i…
We consider a nonlinear parametric Neumann problem driven by the anisotropic $(p,q)$-Laplacian and a reaction which exhibits the combined effects of a singular term and of a parametric superlinear perturbation. We are looking for positive solutions. Using a combination of topological and variational tools together with suitable truncation and comparison techniques, we prove a bifurcation-type result describing the set of positive solutions as the positive parameter $λ$ varies. We also show the existence of minimal positive solutions $u_λ^*$ and determine the monotonicity and continuity propert…
