Existence of positive solutions for 2\(n\)th-order singular sublinear boundary value problems (Q2484276)

The singular boundary value problem \[ (-1)^{n}x^{(2n)}(t)=f(t,x(t),-x''(t),\dots,(-1)^{i}x^{(2i)}(t),\dots,(-1)^{{n-1}}x^{(2n-2)}(t)), \quad t\in(0,1), \] \[ x^{(2i)}(0)=x^{(2i)}(1)=0,\quad i=0,1,2,\dots,n-1,\quad n>1, \] is considered. The nonlinearity \(f(t,x_1,x_2,\dots,x_n)\) may be singular at \(x_i=0\), \(i=1,2,\dots,n\), \(t=0\) and/or \(t=1.\) It is assumed that \(f\in C((0,1)\times(0,\infty)^n,[0,\infty))\) and there exist suitable constants \(\lambda_i,\mu_i\), \(i=1,2,\dots,n,\) such that for \(t\in(0,1)\), \(x_i\in(0,\infty)\) and \(0<c\leq1\) \[ \begin{multlined} c^{\mu_i}f(t,x_1,x_2,\dots,x_i,\dots,x_n)\\ \leq f(t,x_1,x_2,\dots,cx_i,\dots,x_n)\leq c^{\lambda_i}f(t,x_1,x_2,\dots x_i,\dots x_n),\;i=1,2,\dots,n.\end{multlined} \] Under this hypothesis, the author has shown that the considered problem has positive solutions in \(C^{2n-2}[0,1]\) if and only if \(0<\int_0^1{t(1-t)F_1(t)}\,dt<0\), \(\lim_{t\to 0^+}t\int_t^1{(1-s)F_1(s)}\,ds=0\) and \(\lim_{t\to 1^-}(1-t)\int_0^t{sF_1(s)}\,ds=0\) as well as that it has positive solutions in \(C^{2n-1}[0,1]\) if and only if \(0<\int_0^1F_2(t)\,dt<0,\) where \(F_1(t)=f(t,t(1-t),t(1-t),\dots,t(1-t),1)\) and \(F_2(t)=f(t,t(1-t),t(1-t),\dots,t(1-t),t(1-t)).\) To prove these results, the author constructs lower and upper solutions and uses a suitable maximum principle.