On Ambrosetti–Malchiodi–Ni conjecture on two-dimensional smooth bounded domains

We consider the problem

$$\begin{aligned} \epsilon ^2 \Delta u-V(y)u+u^p\,=\,0,\quad u>0\quad \text{ in }\quad \Omega , \quad \frac{\partial u}{\partial \nu }\,=\,0\quad \text{ on }\quad \partial \Omega , \end{aligned}$$

where \(\Omega \) is a bounded domain in \({\mathbb {R}}^2\) with smooth boundary, the exponent p is greater than 1, \(\epsilon >0\) is a small parameter, V is a uniformly positive, smooth potential on \(\bar{\Omega }\), and \(\nu \) denotes the outward unit normal of \(\partial \Omega \). Let \(\Gamma \) be a curve intersecting orthogonally \(\partial \Omega \) at exactly two points and dividing \(\Omega \) into two parts. Moreover, \(\Gamma \) satisfies stationary and non-degeneracy conditions with respect to the functional \(\int _{\Gamma }V^{\sigma }\), where \(\sigma =\frac{p+1}{p-1}-\frac{1}{2}\). We prove the existence of a solution \(u_\epsilon \) concentrating along the whole of \(\Gamma \), exponentially small in \(\epsilon \) at any fixed distance from it, provided that \(\epsilon \) is small and away from certain critical numbers. In particular, this establishes the validity of the two dimensional case of a conjecture by Ambrosetti et al. (Indiana Univ Math J 53(2), 297–329, 2004).

     

Dirichlet and Neumann eigenvalue problems on CR manifolds

We study the properties of Carnot–Carathéodory spaces attached to a strictly pseudoconvex CR manifold M, in a neighborhood of each point \(x \in M\), versus the pseudohermitian geometry of M arising from a fixed positively oriented contact form \(\theta \) on M. The weak Dirichlet problem for the sublaplacian \(\Delta _b\) on \((M, \theta )\) is solved on domains \(\Omega \subset M\) supporting the Poincaré inequality. The solution to Neumann problem for the sublaplacian \(\Delta _b\) on a \(C^{1,1}\) connected \((\epsilon , \delta )\)-domain \(\Omega \subset {{\mathbb {G}}}\) in a Carnot group (due to Danielli et al. in: Memoirs of American Mathematical Society 2006) is revisited for domains in a CR manifold. As an application we prove discreetness of the Dirichlet and Neumann spectra of \(\Delta _b\) on \(\Omega \subset M\) in a Carnot–Carthéodory complete pseudohermitian manifold \((M, \theta )\).     

Partial regularity and smooth topology-preserving approximations of rough domains

For a bounded domain \(\Omega \subset {\mathbb R}^m, m\ge 2,\) of class \(C^0\), the properties are studied of fields of ‘good directions’, that is the directions with respect to which \(\partial \Omega \) can be locally represented as the graph of a continuous function. For any such domain there is a canonical smooth field of good directions defined in a suitable neighbourhood of \(\partial \Omega \), in terms of which a corresponding flow can be defined. Using this flow it is shown that \(\Omega \) can be approximated from the inside and the outside by diffeomorphic domains of class \(C^\infty \). Whether or not the image of a general continuous field of good directions (pseudonormals) defined on \(\partial \Omega \) is the whole of \(S^{m-1}\) is shown to depend on the topology of \(\Omega \). These considerations are used to prove that if \(m=2,3\), or if \(\Omega \) has nonzero Euler characteristic, there is a point \(P\in \partial \Omega \) in the neighbourhood of which \(\partial \Omega \) is Lipschitz. The results provide new information even for more regular domains, with Lipschitz or smooth boundaries.     

The Cheeger constant of a Jordan domain without necks

We show that the maximal Cheeger set of a Jordan domain \(\Omega \) without necks is the union of all balls of radius \(r = h(\Omega )^{-1}\) contained in \(\Omega \). Here, \(h(\Omega )\) denotes the Cheeger constant of \(\Omega \), that is, the infimum of the ratio of perimeter over area among subsets of \(\Omega \), and a Cheeger set is a set attaining the infimum. The radius r is shown to be the unique number such that the area of the inner parallel set \(\Omega ^r\) is equal to \(\pi r^2\). The proof of the main theorem requires the combination of several intermediate facts, some of which are of interest in their own right. Examples are given demonstrating the generality of the result as well as the sharpness of our assumptions. In particular, as an application of the main theorem, we illustrate how to effectively approximate the Cheeger constant of the Koch snowflake.     

Spectral density estimates with partial symmetries and an application to Bahri–Lions-type results

We are concerned with the existence of infinitely many solutions for the problem \(-\Delta u=|u|^{p-2}u+f\) in \(\Omega \), \(u=u_0\) on \(\partial \Omega \), where \(\Omega \) is a bounded domain in \(\mathbb {R}^N\), \(N\ge 3\). This can be seen as a perturbation of the problem with \(f=0\) and \(u_0=0\), which is odd in u. If \(\Omega \) is invariant with respect to a closed strict subgroup of O(N), then we prove infinite existence for all functions f and \(u_0\) in certain spaces of invariant functions for a larger range of exponents p than known before. In order to achieve this, we prove Lieb–Cwikel–Rosenbljum-type bounds for invariant potentials on \(\Omega \), employing improved Sobolev embeddings for spaces of invariant functions.     

Multiplicity Results for the Fractional Laplacian in Expanding Domains

In this paper, we establish a multiplicity result of nontrivial weak solutions for the problem \((-\Delta )^{\alpha } u +u= h(u)\)    in \(\Omega _{\lambda }\), \(u=0\)    on \(\partial \Omega _{\lambda }\), where \(\Omega _{\lambda }=\lambda \Omega \), \(\Omega \) is a smooth and bounded domain in \({\mathbb {R}}^N, N>2\alpha \), \(\lambda \) is a positive parameter, \(\alpha \in (0,1)\), \((-\Delta )^{\alpha }\) is the fractional Laplacian and the nonlinear term h(u) has subcritical growth. We use minimax methods, the Ljusternick–Schnirelmann and Morse theories to get multiplicity results depending on the topology of \(\Omega \).     

On the Multiplication Tuples Related to Certain Reproducing Kernel Hilbert Spaces

We consider a class of subnormal operator tuples \(M_z\) consisting of multiplications by coordinate functions on a class of reproducing kernel Hilbert spaces associated with certain bounded domains \(\Omega \) in \({\mathbb {C}}^m\), with the closure \({{\bar{\Omega }}}\) of \(\Omega \) being the Taylor spectrum of \(M_z\) and the topological boundary \(\partial \Omega \) of \(\Omega \) being the Taylor essential spectrum of \(M_z\). If T is a subnormal operator tuple quasisimilar to \(M_z\), then we show that the Taylor spectrum of T is \({{\bar{\Omega }}}\) provided \({{\bar{\Omega }}}\) is polynomially convex and provided \(\Omega \) is either strictly pseudoconvex with \(C^2\) boundary or is starlike, and that the Taylor essential spectrum of T is \(\partial \Omega \) provided \(\Omega \) satisfies the Gleason property as well. This generalizes some previous work of the first-named author in the context of the unit ball and the unit polydisk. The relevant theory is then applied to the multiplication tuples on the Hardy and Bergman spaces of complex ellipsoids.     

Global $$C^{1,\al pha }$$ regularity and e xistence of multi ple solutions for singular p( x)-La placian equations

In this paper we study the following singular p(x)-Laplacian problem

$$\begin{aligned} \left\{ \begin{array}{l@{\quad }l} - \text{ div } \left( |\nabla u|^{p(x)-2} \nabla u\right) =\frac{ \lambda }{u^{\beta (x)}}+u^{q(x)}, &{} \text{ in }\quad \Omega , \\ u>0, &{} \text{ in }\quad \Omega , \\ u=0, &{} \text{ on }\quad \partial \Omega , \end{array}\right. \end{aligned}$$

where \(\Omega \) is a bounded domain in \(\mathbb {R}^N\), \(N\ge 2\), with smooth boundary \(\partial \Omega \), \(\beta \in C^1(\bar{\Omega })\) with \( 0< \beta (x) <1\), \(p\in C^1(\bar{\Omega })\), \(q \in C(\bar{\Omega })\) with \(p(x)>1\), \(p(x)< q(x) +1 <p^*(x)\) for \(x \in \bar{\Omega }\), where \( p^*(x)= \frac{Np(x)}{N-p(x)} \) for \(p(x) <N\) and \( p^*(x)= \infty \) for \( p(x) \ge N\). We establish \(C^{1,\alpha }\) regularity of weak solutions of the problem and strong comparison principle. Based on these two results, we prove the existence of multiple (at least two) positive solutions for a certain range of \(\lambda \).

     

Estimates for large solutions of a quasilinear elliptic equation

Let \(\Omega \) be a bounded smooth domain of \(R^{n}\). We study the asymptotic behaviour of the solutions to the equation \(\triangle u-|Du|^{q}=f(u)\) in \(\Omega , 1<q<2,\) which satisfy the boundary condition \(u(x)\rightarrow \infty \) as \(x\rightarrow \partial \Omega \). These solutions are called large or blowup solutions. Near the boundary we give lower and upper bounds for the ratio \(\psi (u)/\delta \), where \(\psi (u) = \int _{u}^{\infty }1/\sqrt{2F}dt\), \(F'=f\), \(\delta =dist(x,\partial \Omega )\) or for the ratio \(u/\delta ^{(2-q)/(1-q)}\). When in particular the ratio \(f/F^{q/2}\)is regular at infinity, we find again known results (Bandle and Giarrusso, in Adv Diff Equ 1, 133–150, 1996; Giarrusso, in Comptes Rendus de l’Acad Sci 331, 777–782 2000).     

A characterization of cut locus for $$C^1$$ hypersurfaces

Let \(\Omega \) be an open set in \(\mathbb {R}^n\) with \(C^1\)-boundary and \(\Sigma \) be the skeleton of \(\Omega \), which consists of points where the distance function to \(\partial \Omega \) is not differentiable. This paper characterizes the cut locus (ridge) \(\overline{\Sigma }\), which is the closure of the skeleton, by introducing a generalized radius of curvature and its lower semicontinuous envelope. As an application we give a sufficient condition for vanishing of the Lebesgue measure of \(\overline{\Sigma }\).     

Infiltration Equation with Degeneracy on the Boundary

This paper is mainly about the infiltration equation

$$ {u_{t}}= \operatorname{div} \bigl(a(x)|u|^{\alpha }{ \vert { \nabla u} \vert ^{p-2}}\nabla u\bigr),\quad (x,t) \in \Omega \times (0,T), $$

where \(p>1\), \(\alpha >0\), \(a(x)\in C^{1}(\overline{\Omega })\), \(a(x)\geq 0\) with \(a(x)|_{x\in \partial \Omega }=0\). If there is a constant \(\beta \) such that \(\int_{\Omega }a^{-\beta }(x)dx\leq c\), \(p>1+\frac{1}{\beta }\), then the weak solution is smooth enough to define the trace on the boundary, the stability of the weak solutions can be proved as usual. Meanwhile, if for any \(\beta >\frac{1}{p-1}\), \(\int_{\Omega }a^{-\beta }(x)dxdt=\infty \), then the weak solution lacks the regularity to define the trace on the boundary. The main innovation of this paper is to introduce a new kind of the weak solutions. By these new definitions of the weak solutions, one can study the stability of the weak solutions without any boundary value condition.

     

Reducibility of operator semigroups and values of vector states

Let \(\mathcal S\) be a multiplicative semigroup of bounded linear operators on a complex Hilbert space \(\mathcal H\), and let \(\Omega \) be the range of a vector state on \(\mathcal S\) so that \(\Omega = \{ \langle S \xi , \xi \rangle \,{:}\,S \in \mathcal S\}\) for some fixed unit vector \(\xi \in \mathcal H\). We study the structure of sets \(\Omega \) of cardinality two coming from irreducible semigroups \(\mathcal S\). This leads us to sufficient conditions for reducibility and, in some cases, for the existence of common fixed points for \(\mathcal S\). This is made possible by a thorough investigation of the structure of maximal families \(\mathcal F\) of unit vectors in \(\mathcal H\) with the property that there exists a fixed constant \(\rho \in \mathbb C\) for which \(\langle x, y \rangle = \rho \) for all distinct pairs x and y in \(\mathcal F\).     

Zero varieties for the Nevanlinna class in weakly pseudoconvex domains of maximal type F in $$\mathbb {C}^2$$

Let \(\Omega \) be a bounded, uniformly totally pseudoconvex domain in \(\mathbb {C}^2\) with smooth boundary \(b\Omega \). Assume that \(\Omega \) is a domain admitting a maximal type F. Here, the condition maximal type F generalizes the condition of finite type in the sense of Range (Pac J Math 78(1):173–189, 1978; Scoula Norm Sup Pisa, pp 247–267, 1978) and includes many cases of infinite type. Let \(\alpha \) be a d-closed (1, 1)-form in \(\Omega \). We study the Poincaré–Lelong equation

$$\begin{aligned} i\partial \bar{\partial }u=\alpha \quad \text {on}\, \Omega \end{aligned}$$

in \(L^1(b\Omega )\) norm by applying the \(L^1(b\Omega )\) estimates for \(\bar{\partial }_b\)-equations in [11]. Then, we also obtain a prescribing zero set of Nevanlinna holomorphic functions in \(\Omega \).

     

Quasilinear equations with natural growth in the gradients in spaces of Sobolev multipliers

We study the existence problem for a class of nonlinear elliptic equations whose prototype is of the form \(-\Delta _p u = |\nabla u|^p + \sigma \) in a bounded domain \(\Omega \subset \mathbb {R}^n\). Here \(\Delta _p\), \(p>1\), is the standard p-Laplacian operator defined by \(\Delta _p u=\mathrm{div}\, (|\nabla u|^{p-2}\nabla u)\), and the datum \(\sigma \) is a signed distribution in \(\Omega \). The class of solutions that we are interested in consists of functions \(u\in W^{1,p}_0(\Omega )\) such that \(|\nabla u|\in M(W^{1,p}(\Omega )\rightarrow L^p(\Omega ))\), a space pointwise Sobolev multipliers consisting of functions \(f\in L^{p}(\Omega )\) such that

$$\begin{aligned} \int _{\Omega } |f|^{p} |\varphi |^p dx \le C \int _{\Omega } (|\nabla \varphi |^p + |\varphi |^p) dx \quad \forall \varphi \in C^\infty (\Omega ), \end{aligned}$$

for some \(C>0\). This is a natural class of solutions at least when the distribution \(\sigma \) is nonnegative and compactly supported in \(\Omega \). We show essentially that, with only a gap in the smallness constants, the above equation has a solution in this class if and only if one can write \(\sigma =\mathrm{div}\, F\) for a vector field F such that \(|F|^{\frac{1}{p-1}}\in M(W^{1,p}(\Omega )\rightarrow L^p(\Omega ))\). As an important application, via the exponential transformation \(u\mapsto v=e^{\frac{u}{p-1}}\), we obtain an existence result for the quasilinear equation of Schrödinger type \(-\Delta _p v = \sigma \, v^{p-1}\), \(v\ge 0\) in \(\Omega \), and \(v=1\) on \(\partial \Omega \), which is interesting in its own right.

     

Local Maximum Modulus Property for Polyanalytic Functions

Let \(\Omega \subset {\mathbb {C}}\) be an open subset and let \({\mathcal {F}}\) be a space of functions defined on \(\Omega \). \({\mathcal {F}}\) is said to have the local maximum modulus property if: for every \(f\in {\mathcal {F}},p_0\in \Omega ,\) and for every sufficiently small domain \(D\subset \Omega ,\) with \(p_0\in D,\) it holds true that \(\max _{z\in \overline{D}}\left| f(z)\right| = \max _{z\in \Sigma \cup \partial D}\left| f(z)\right| ,\) where \(\Sigma \subset \Omega \) denotes the set of points at which \(\left| f\right| \) attains strict local maximum. This property fails for \({\mathcal {F}}=C^{\infty }.\) We verify it however for the set of complex-valued functions whose real and imaginary parts are real analytic. We show by example that the property cannot be improved upon whenever \({\mathcal {F}}\) is the set of n-analytic functions on \(\Omega \), \(n\ge 2,\) in the sense that locality cannot be removed as a condition and independently \(\Sigma \) cannot be removed from the conclusion.     

Mean curvature bounds and eigenvalues of Robin Laplacians

We consider the Laplacian with attractive Robin boundary conditions,

$$\begin{aligned} Q^\Omega _\alpha u=-\Delta u, \quad \dfrac{\partial u}{\partial n}=\alpha u \text { on } \partial \Omega , \end{aligned}$$

in a class of bounded smooth domains \(\Omega \in \mathbb {R}^\nu \); here \(n\) is the outward unit normal and \(\alpha >0\) is a constant. We show that for each \(j\in \mathbb {N}\) and \(\alpha \rightarrow +\infty \), the \(j\)th eigenvalue \(E_j(Q^\Omega _\alpha )\) has the asymptotics

$$\begin{aligned} E_j(Q^\Omega _\alpha )=-\alpha ^2 -(\nu -1)H_\mathrm {max}(\Omega )\,\alpha +{\mathcal O}(\alpha ^{2/3}), \end{aligned}$$

where \(H_\mathrm {max}(\Omega )\) is the maximum mean curvature at \(\partial \Omega \). The discussion of the reverse Faber-Krahn inequality gives rise to a new geometric problem concerning the minimization of \(H_\mathrm {max}\). In particular, we show that the ball is the strict minimizer of \(H_\mathrm {max}\) among the smooth star-shaped domains of a given volume, which leads to the following result: if \(B\) is a ball and \(\Omega \) is any other star-shaped smooth domain of the same volume, then for any fixed \(j\in \mathbb {N}\) we have \(E_j(Q^B_\alpha )>E_j(Q^\Omega _\alpha )\) for large \(\alpha \). An open question concerning a larger class of domains is formulated.

     

On the approximation of dynamical indicators in systems with nonuniformly hyperbolic behavior

Let f be a \(C^{1+\alpha }\) diffeomorphism of a compact Riemannian manifold and \(\mu \) an ergodic hyperbolic measure with positive entropy. We prove that for every continuous potential \(\phi \) there exists a sequence of basic sets \(\Omega _n\) such that the topological pressure \(P(f|\Omega _n,\phi )\) converges to the free energy \(P_{\mu }(\phi ) = h(\mu ) + \int \phi {d\mu }\). We also prove that for a suitable class of potentials \(\phi \) there exists a sequence of basic sets \(\Omega _n\) such that \(P(f|\Omega _n,\phi ) \rightarrow P(\phi )\).     

Eigenvalue Counting Function for Robin Laplacians on Conical Domains

We study the discrete spectrum of the Robin Laplacian \(Q^{\Omega }_\alpha \) in \(L^2(\Omega )\), \(u\mapsto -\Delta u, \quad D_n u=\alpha u \text { on }\partial \Omega \), where \(D_n\) is the outer unit normal derivative and \(\Omega \subset {\mathbb {R}}^{3}\) is a conical domain with a regular cross-section \(\Theta \subset {\mathbb {S}}^2\), n is the outer unit normal, and \(\alpha >0\) is a fixed constant. It is known from previous papers that the bottom of the essential spectrum of \(Q^{\Omega }_\alpha \) is \(-\alpha ^2\) and that the finiteness of the discrete spectrum depends on the geometry of the cross-section. We show that the accumulation of the discrete spectrum of \(Q^\Omega _\alpha \) is determined by the discrete spectrum of an effective Hamiltonian defined on the boundary and far from the origin. By studying this model operator, we prove that the number of eigenvalues of \(Q^{\Omega }_\alpha \) in \((-\infty ,-\alpha ^2-\lambda )\), with \(\lambda >0\), behaves for \(\lambda \rightarrow 0\) as

$$\begin{aligned} \dfrac{\alpha ^2}{8\pi \lambda } \int _{\partial \Theta } \kappa _+(s)^2\mathrm {d}s +o\left( \frac{1}{\lambda }\right) , \end{aligned}$$

where \(\kappa _+\) is the positive part of the geodesic curvature of the cross-section boundary.

     

Removability of the logarithmic singularity for the elliptic PDEs with measurable coefficients and its consequences

This paper introduces the notion of log-regularity (or log-irregularity) of the boundary point \(\zeta \) (possibly \(\zeta =\infty \)) of the arbitrary open subset \(\Omega \) of the Greenian deleted neigborhood of \(\zeta \) in \({\mathbb {R}}^2\) concerning second order uniformly elliptic equations with bounded and measurable coefficients, according as whether the log-harmonic measure of \(\zeta \) is null (or positive). A necessary and sufficient condition for the removability of the logarithmic singularity, that is to say for the existence of a unique solution to the Dirichlet problem in \(\Omega \) in a class \(O(\log |\cdot - \zeta |)\) is established in terms of the Wiener test for the log-regularity of \(\zeta \). From a topological point of view, the Wiener test at \(\zeta \) presents the minimal thinness criteria of sets near \(\zeta \) in minimal fine topology. Precisely, the open set \(\Omega \) is a deleted neigborhood of \(\zeta \) in minimal fine topology if and only if \(\zeta \) is log-irregular. From the probabilistic point of view, the Wiener test presents asymptotic law for the log-Brownian motion near \(\zeta \) conditioned on the logarithmic kernel with pole at \(\zeta \).     

Revisiting Fryszkowski’s problem

Professor Andrzej Fryszkowski formulated, at the 2nd Symposium on Nonlinear Analysis in Toruń, September 13–17, 1999, the following problem: given \(\alpha \in (0,1)\), an arbitrary non-empty set \(\Omega \) and a set-valued mapping \(F:\Omega \rightarrow 2^{\Omega }\), find necessary and (or) sufficient conditions for the existence of a (complete) metric d on \(\Omega \) having the property that F is a Nadler set-valued \(\alpha \)-contraction with respect to d. Com?neci (Stud. Univ. Babe?-Bolyai Math. 62:537–542, 2017) provided necessary and sufficient conditions for the existence of a complete and bounded metric d on \(\Omega \) having the property that F is a Nadler set-valued \(\alpha \)-contraction with respect to d, in case that \(\alpha \in (0,\frac{1}{2})\) and there exists \(z\in \Omega \) such that \(F(z)=\{z\}\) . We improve Com?neci’s result by allowing \(\alpha \) to belong to the interval (0, 1). In addition, we provide necessary and sufficient conditions for the existence of a complete and bounded metric d on \(\Omega \) such that F is a Nadler set-valued \(\alpha \)-similarity with respect to d, in case that \(\alpha \in (0,1)\), there exists \(z\in \Omega \) such that \(F(z)=\{z\}\) and F is non-overlapping.