Remarks on the bifurcation of solutions of a nonlinear eigenvalue problem

Conclusions We have investigated solutions of equation (3) when ² is an eigenvalue of the linearized operator (13) and when it is not. In Section 4 we have shown that for 0 and ² = _i ² we have exactly two nontrivial solutions which bifurcate to the right of _i ² ; these solutions are shown to exist in an interval ( _i ² , _i ² + ₀). The method of Section 3 may then be used to extend these two solutions to the right of _i ² + ₀ providing that ²= _i ² + ₀ is not an eigenvalue of the linear operator (13) evaluated at = ± ₁. Either a solution can be uniquely extended, or there exists a value of ²where the bifurcation method must be applied again³.While the method used here gives the exact number of solutions bifurcating from _i ² , other problems remain open; for example, it is still not proven that the two bifurcating branches have i zeros, as is the case for Hammerstein operators with oscillation kernels 4]. The conjecture of Odeh and Tadjbakhsh that there are exactly 2(i+1) nontrivial solutions in the interval _i ² < _i ^+1/2 remains un-answered, although it would be proven if one could show that there is no secondary bifurcation as in the cases of Kolodner 7] and Coffman 8].