Nonlinear programming,approximation, and optimization on infinitely differentiable functions

A nonnegative, infinitely differentiable function defined on the real line is called a Friedrichs mollifier function if it has support in [0, 1] and ₀¹(t)dt=1. In this article, the following problem is considered. Determine _k=inf₀¹|^(k)(t)|dt,k=1, 2, ..., where ^(k) denotes thekth derivative of and the infimum is taken over the set of all mollifier functions , which is a convex set. This problem has applications to monotone polynomial approximation as shown by this author elsewhere. The problem is reducible to three equivalent problems, a nonlinear programming problem, a problem on the functions of bounded variation, and an approximation problem involving Tchebycheff polynomials. One of the results of this article shows that _k=k!2^2k–1,k=1, 2, .... The numerical values of the optimal solutions of the three problems are obtained as a function ofk. Some inequalities of independent interest are also derived.This research was supported in part by the National Science Foundation, Grant No. GK-32712.