The classification of self-adjoint boundary conditions: Separated, coupled, and mixed

There are three basic types of self-adjoint regular and singular boundary conditions: separated, coupled, and mixed. For even order problems with real coefficients, one regular endpoint and arbitrary deficiency index d, we give a construction for each type and determine the number of possible conditions of each type under the assumption that there are d linearly independent square-integrable solutions for some real value of the spectral parameter. In the separated case our construction yields non-real conditions for all orders greater than two. It is well known that no such conditions exist in the second order case. Our construction gives a direct alternative to the recent construction of Everitt and Markus which uses the theory of symplectic spaces. We believe our construction will prove useful in the spectral analysis of these operators and in obtaining canonical forms of self-adjoint boundary conditions. Such forms are known only in the second order, i.e. Sturm-Liouville, case. Even for regular problems of order four no such forms are available.