Canonical forms of self-adjoint boundary conditions for differential operators of order four (Q655520)

This work gives canonical forms for self-adjoint boundary conditions for eigenvalue problems of the form \[ [(p_2y'')'+(p_1y')]'+p_0y=\lambda wy \] \[ \displaystyle \] on an interval \((a,b)\). Possible boundary conditions fall into three types: ``coupled,'' ``separated,'' and ``mixed,'' depending on the rank of a suitable matrix. In each type, the possible boundary conditions may be obtained from a ``fundamental form'' by matrix operations. The paper relies on earlier work by \textit{A. Wang, J. Sun} and \textit{A. Zettl} [J. Funct. Anal. 255, No. 6, 1554--1573 (2008; Zbl 1170.34017)].