Let be a second order elliptic differential operator in with no zero order terms and let be a bounded domain in with smooth boundary . We say that a function is -harmonic if in . Every positive -harmonic function has a unique representation where is the Poisson kernel for and is a finite measure on . We call the trace of on . Our objective is to investigate positive solutions of a nonlinear equation for the restriction is imposed because our main tool is the -superdiffusion which is not defined for ]. We associate with every solution a pair , where is a closed subset of and is a Radon measure on . We call the trace of on . is empty if and only if is dominated by an -harmonic function. We call such solutions moderate. A moderate solution is determined uniquely by its trace. In general, many solutions can have the same trace. We establish necessary and sufficient conditions for a pair to be a trace, and we give a probabilistic formula for the maximal solution with a given trace. |